The Kaiba Heir
by Z.Quill
Summary: Seto knew things would change when he became a Kaiba. But, a new brother was not part of his and Gozaburo's deal. The life of the Kaiba family as brothers compete for their place as the heir of Gozaburo's company and the very right to be called a 'Kaiba'.
1. This Is My Home

**Hello! If you've visited my profile, you know that this is the Culminating Project fic that I'm using to pass as a senior in high school, so thank you for supporting me, even if you didn't necessarily intend to. I have just a few announcements before we get on with the actual story:**

**One: If you don't like the fics that have Noah as never having been in his "accident," then, you are in the wrong fic. However, feel free to give it a chance. You might find you enjoy this genre of ****Yugioh!**** fanfiction.**

**Two: As part of the Culminating Project, I'm going to be submitting some of the reviews I get as well as my responses to them. If you don't want your review to be part of this, please tell me so in the review. This, of course, does not mean don't give negative reviews, but, if you do, please at least tell me why you don't like it so that I might be able to improve it. **

**Three: Timelines. I admit I have an occasion problem when it comes to updates, especially with ****The One Friend of Seto Kaiba****, but, for the purposes of this fic, there will be definite dates for the publishing of chapters, posted at the bottom of the previous chapter and on my profile.**

**I renounce all claims to the characters, settings, etc. of ****Yugioh!****.**

**I'm so glad to have finally gotten out this first chapter, so please enjoy:**

**Chapter One: This is **_**My**_** Home**

Noah, face pinched and eyes shadowed from lack of sleep, watched out the window as his new "brothers" were driven to the front door. He did not want to believe this was actually happening. "_Seto_" and "_Mokuba_" were going to ruin _everything_ Noah had going for him.

The two stepped from the car, and Noah got his first look at the interlopers.

The younger of them was clinging to his brother's side, a shell-shocked look on his features and a scraggly purple backpack on. He was holding tightly to his older brother's vest, clutching him as if he would slip away at any second.

_Pathetic,_ Noah thought. But, Noah barely spared the smaller child a thought. It was the older brother that concerned him.

_He_ was standing tall, shoulders set back in self-confidence and eyes singularly focused upon the front door. He was the one to watch out for, the one his father had been so excited about.

Noah didn't know what this boy had done to insinuate himself in this family, but, no matter how many arguments Noah presented to his father, Gozaburo refused to change his mind in regards to taking the boys in. Noah couldn't believe his father could do something like this to him. Noah was now experiencing feelings he'd never before had reason to feel in his life: anger, abandonment, jealousy.

_He_ was going to have to share _his_ father with a couple of street rats all because his father thought that _he_, Noah Kaiba, wasn't exceeding where he should be. Was he not getting perfect scores in his education? Was he not constantly being praised by his instructors for his mental prowess? Was he not playing the part of the adoring son to perfection?

…If so, _why_ was he now watching two dirty, stupid orphans walk into _his_ house like they owned the place?

Pausing before entering the house, the younger orphan brother looked up and saw the teal-haired boy in the window above, watching them. The child blinked, and Noah quickly and disdainfully turned way to avoid acknowledging the little brat.

Noah would not forgive his father for this He would never—

"Noah," said a gruff voice from the direction of the shadowed doorway. Noah jumped and quickly spun to face the darkened figure standing just inside the room.

"Yes, Father?"

Gozaburo stepped further into the room and into the light of the window, squinting his beady yellow eyes as he did so. Noah took a step back, allowing his father more room. Noah definitely loved his father… but, even he feared the domineering and cruel man Gozaburo could be.

One glance at the window with his squinting eyes, and Gozaburo knew what his son had been up to.

"What do you think of them?" he questioned, taking another step towards the window, an unexpected glittering gleam in his gaze as he looked down on Noah from the corner of his eye. It was instances like these that Noah feared the most. You could be sure that, no matter what you did, you'd be walking into a trap.

"I-I think…" he stammered. Taking a breath, he gathered his courage and, attempting to hold his father's mustard stare, he spouted, "I think they're worthless, and it was a mistake to bring them here."

"A _mistake_?" Gozaburo barked, the false calm shattering in the face of Gozaburo's displeasure with his son. "The very fact that you think they're useless and don't see the opportunities they represent proves to me that this was anything but a mistake!"

Quaking, Noah started, "But, Father—"

"No 'but's' in my house. I'm sick of your whining, Noah!" Gozaburo turned on his heel and began to stalk away. "Learn to take things like a man, Noah, or learn to accept people, like those two orphans, as being superior to you."

"Father!" Noah exclaimed, shocked and hurt to his very core by his father's rejection.

Gozaburo stopped at the doorway and turned his head to the side to give his son a sinister glare.

"_Seto _would never be so rash and thoughtless as to continue in this vein."

The mention of the other boy's name had the desired effect, Noah clamming up immediately, wanting to show that he was better than _Seto_.

The gleam that had previously been there came back to Gozaburo's eyes as his suppositions as to the benefits of adopting Seto and his brother were shown to be correct.

"Let's go, Noah. It's time to go down and greet your brothers." A sneer evident in Gozaburo's voice did not appear on his face.

Noah, head ducked, moved to his father's side, but didn't dare to attempt to precede him. Gozaburo stepped forward, Noah closely trailing him.

Dark thoughts began swarming in Noah's mind as they made their way down the hallway. He would be better than this Seto. He was his father's only son, and only he would be loved by him.

Seto hadn't noticed Noah peering at them from the upper window when they'd walked up to the house. Even if he had, he would have dismissed him as quickly as he'd seen him. There was no time to be worrying about the son of a servant, or whatever the kid may have been. So, it was a minor surprise when Mokuba began tugging at his vest as they were walking at the front and asked him, "Seto, did you see that boy up here?"

"No, Mokuba," he answered distantly. There were more important things to be thinking about.

Any moment, Seto felt that his heart was going to explode. Every sound brought him another step closer to jumping right out of his skin. Trepidation filled him as to what awaited him inside this house. But, a certainty also lingered that, from the moment their parents had left them alone, every move that had been made by either himself or others had all been to get him to this point, to these doors. He'd won his way here, and to hell if he was going anywhere.

"Let's go, Mokuba." He took the first steps into their new life, Mokuba doing his best to cling and follow as closely to his brother as he could without tripping him up.

As they reached the door, the man who had driven them from the orphanage opened the door for them before standing aside, allowing them to enter first. Mokuba thought it was classy; Seto noticed the dull, robotic look in the man's eyes and thought that had more to do with it than any sense of courtesy. He spared the man a mistrustful gaze before redirecting his sight ahead. They walked through, the man following them and taking up a guard position by the door.

Mokuba gasped from behind his brother, who felt his own eyes and lips drifting open at the grandeur suddenly before them. The foyer, if such a word could describe the expansive, two-story area, had an open balcony looking over it at the far end, two staircases on either side sweeping down to the lower level. Beneath the balcony were several Doric pillars and, beyond those, a wall of windows showing an unexpected inner stone courtyard. The light reflected off the beige stones shown through the windows, illuminating the room in aloof but warm tones. It mirrored itself particularly well off the white marble tiles that, paired with black ones, created a checkerboard pattern on the floor where it wasn't covered with an extensive crimson runner that, in turn, made paths up the staircases and through doors that lead off the foyer.

Along the walls of the room were filled bookshelves and glass-fronted cabinets holding various artifacts, figurines, and the occasional photograph to be shown off to any visiting public. Several loveseats and straight backed chairs were also scattered about to offer a place for people to admire the pieces on display more closely and intently. Everything had a gold, cream, or crimson color to it, with the exception of mahogany wood accents.

"It's supposed to impress, it's supposed to impress…" Seto reminded himself again and again under his breath. _Don't give into it._

"Seto, are we really going to live here?" Mokuba asked, pressing up against his brother's side, awe evident in his voice.

Before Seto could respond a high-pitched, condescending 'ha' sounded from the balcony opposite them. They looked up to see the teal-haired boy Mokuba had seen before was standing there, an odd look that combined laughter and affront on his face. The boy was suddenly in movement, somewhat hurrying down the right side staircase and across the space to the two out-of-place boys just inside the door. "Did you really just ask that question?" he asked upon reaching them, a snidely curl to his lips.

Mokuba slunk even further behind Seto, trying to get as much between himself and the intimidating, nasty boy as he could. Looking up, Mokuba noticed that Noah's eyes were the exact color as Seto's, which was not in the least bit comforting considering the disgusted look he had as he looked upon Mokuba.

Seto, on the other hand, wasn't being so much intimidated by the teal-haired boy as put-off and annoyed. He'd dealt with people like this at the orphanage: stuck-up, selfish, and hostile, with a generous side-dish of insecure. It was the basic make-up of a bully.

And, Seto hated bullies.

"Don't even bother to think of calling this your home," Noah continued. Mokuba lowered his eyes again, trying to hide his disappointment while Seto's eyes were filled with anger and confusion. "You two are going to be back in that orphanage before you can—"

"Now, now, Noah," Gozaburo lightly admonished from the balcony. Letting Noah go first had given him the first glimpse as to what the future was going to hold within the Kaiba house, and it was quite interesting. He began making his own way down the left-hand stairs. "We'll have to wait and see how things turn out before anything like that needs saying." He made it to the bottom and walked to the center of the room.

'_Wait and see how things turn out?'_ Seto thought, scoffing in his mind. He and Gozaburo had a deal, and it would be Gozaburo who would pay if he didn't honor it.

"Hey, Pops," Seto greeted viciously, unable to keep his emotions wholly leashed. He walked past the unknown boy to take his own stand in the center of the room, right before Gozaburo Kaiba.

"Seto," Gozaburo greeted, his amusement confusing Seto and putting him on guard. Gozaburo turned his unpleasant gaze to the little one that had followed Seto unwillingly to stand near their now adoptive father. "And, hello to you too…"

"It's 'Mokuba'," the little one supplied quietly, blushing, realizing the man didn't even have a clue as to what to call him.

"Mm, yes, right," Gozaburo dismissed. "Noah, come here," he suddenly called. Noah came over and stood close beside Gozaburo, glaring at the orphans.

"Noah, meet Seto and Mokuba, my new adoptive sons," Gozaburo introduced. Seto didn't like the way Gozaburo's eyes seemed to laugh at his own actions. It felt as if he was the one actually being laughed at. _But, why?_

"Hello," Mokuba politely greeted. Noah lifted his nose and turned his face away. The kid was really getting on Seto's nerves. If he kept treating Mokuba like this, the green-haired punk was going to end up with a bloody nose.

"Seto, Mokuba, meet Noah… my son," Gozaburo let drop. He watched as his words took effect on the two who had thought they were so smart and knew everything when they'd twisted Gozaburo's arm. _That will teach them._

"Son?" Mokuba's voice wavered dangerously. Had Seto known about this? He looked up to see a look combining anger and shock on Seto's face, but it was gone in an instant… on the outside.

_No. This wasn't part of the plan,_ Seto growled in his mind. It had been going perfectly. Everything he'd done had been to bring them to this point had been pulled off flawlessly, only to now find that everything had been thrown on its head.

He caught a look of smug satisfaction on Gozaburo's face.

_Don't think you've won because of this, old man,_ Seto snarled in his mind.

Gathering himself, he stepped up to Noah, offering his hand. "Hello, Noah," he was able to get out without choking on the words.

Noah turned his hatred-burning eyes to Seto and then to his proffered hand, then back.

"I hope you _die_." And, with that, Noah ran from the foyer, up the stairs and away down the hallways to his room.

"You'll have to excuse Noah," Gozaburo said stiffly once Noah was gone. His son would definitely be _talked_ with that night for showing himself to be even more uncivilized than the orphan brats. "He hasn't had much time to get used to the idea of being a brother."

"Maybe if we'd had more time, we'd have been able to react in the same fashion," Seto commented coolly, pointedly looking up at Gozaburo.

Gozaburo looked down in turn, and Mokuba stepped away from them both. The same quality that had been in the air during the fateful chess match at the orphanage was back; an atmosphere that excluded everyone and everything but Seto and Gozaburo.

For a long time they just stared…

…Then, Gozaburo smirked, and Seto stiffened.

"No worries, Seto. I'm sure you're quite capable of the same degree of vulgarity, probably without any effort at all." Gozaburo smirked again before calling out loudly, "Anna!"

A maid in traditional black and white uniform appeared almost immediately through one of the doors off the foyer.

"Take Seto and Mokuba to their rooms and give them their instructions," Gozaburo ordered.

"Yes, sir." Anna curtseyed and waited for Gozaburo stride back up the stairs and follow Noah's path before making her way over to the newcomers. "If you will follow me." She turned and began to take the left-hand stairs to the second floor.

Seto grabbed their suitcase from the floor and followed her, Mokuba following him.

"Seto…?"

"Not now, Mokuba. Later," he commanded gently. They needed to wait to talk to be sure that no one would overhear them.

"'Kay," Mokuba mumbled. Seto didn't like putting his brother down, but it was important that they learn to keep their silence in a place like this.

Reaching the landing, Anna waited for them to catch up before turning left. There were more windows overlooking the courtyard up here and, in the brief moment they passed by Seto and Mokuba saw movement below.

"Are you allowed to answer questions, Anna?" Seto asked suddenly.

"If it is in my ability to do so," she answered, showing no emotion in her voice, but a tenseness in her shoulders.

"Who decides whether a question is in your ability?" Seto prodded testily.

"I'm unable to answer that question, sir."

"I thought so," Seto muttered darkly, glaring at the back of the maid for a moment before continuing. "Does something live in the courtyard, Anna?"

"Yes. Mr. Kaiba owns two Chow Chows. They were gifts from the ambassador from China, though I believe the ambassador referred to them as 'Songshi Quan'."

"He has dogs?" Mokuba asked, amazed. He hadn't seen the man who'd adopted them as the animal-loving type. He didn't seem like the type to love anything.

"As I said, they were gifts. I'd advise you to stay away from Fu Xi and Nu Wa, though, sirs."

"Oh?" Mokuba questioned. His eyes widened as Seto's eyes narrowed.

"Chow Chows are pointedly not known for their liking of strangers, sirs. They only like Mr. Kaiba," with that last bit if information Anna shut up, running a hand back through her shoulder-length brown hair.

They turned right and went along a corridor that had windows all along one side showing the courtyard. Looking down, Seto and Mokuba saw the two dogs lounging in the sun, the light imbedding itself in their red coats.

Mokuba giggled quietly. "They're just giant balls of fuzz," he commented.

Seto gave his little brother a little smile. "Yeah. But, make sure to stay away from them, okay? You heard what she said," Seto reinforced Anna's warning. Either one of those "giant balls of fuzz" was twice the size of Mokuba, and could easily do serious harm to the eight-year-old.

Mokuba sighed. "Okay." It was going to be a true trial for Mokuba, too. He loved animals.

They made another turn and left the courtyard behind as they headed deeper into the house. Eventually, they came to the back of the house, what they would later know as the Westward Wing of the Kaiba mansion, and stopped in front of a door made from ebony wood.

"This will be… Seto's room," Anna announced, getting used to the new name.

She opened the door and stepped aside, indicating Seto should go first. But, he didn't.

"I want to see Mokuba's room," he said, not even looking at the room, instead fixing his cobalt gaze on Anna.

"Oh, um, I believe Mr. Kaiba wished for you to remain in your room, as part of his instructions."

"I would like to see Mokuba's room," Seto said more slowly, getting impatient.

Anna was flustered. For Mr. Kaiba to bring such a forceful creature into his house was much unexpected.

"I'm afraid—"

"We both have stuff in this suitcase," Seto said, lifting his little burden, finding a plausible excuse to see his where his brother would be staying. "We need to get his things out first, and then I can come back to my room and do my own unpacking," he finished explaining dispassionately.

"Ah, well, I suppose…"

"There we are, then." Seto reached out and closed the door. "…Shall we?" he asked her, waiting for her to show the way.

"Er, yes. Follow me, please."

She took them back the way they had come for several hallways, each turn making Seto more suspicious and Mokuba more nervous. When they went down a flight of stairs, Mokuba reached out and snagged his brother's hand. Even at the orphanage, Seto had never been more than three doors away. How was he supposed to deal with his big brother being so far from him?

"This will be your little brother's room," Anna addressed Seto, reaching an oak door at the end of a corridor.

"Hm. I can find my way back. You can go now." Again, Seto looked right into her eyes, shocking her at his straightforward superiority.

"Er, alright. Uh, yes. Good day, sir." She gave a tiny curtsy out of habit, then turned and hurried away, completely forgetting the other instruction she was supposed to give them. Instead, thinking, _It's like there are two Mr. Kaiba's in the house_.

Seto stood, watching and making sure she was actually leaving before he opened the door and went inside the room.

"Wow. It's huge," Mokuba said, an uncertain tremor in his voice as Seto closed the door behind them. It was true: the vaulting ceiling and massive area made the room twice the size of one of the orphanage's classrooms. But, it wasn't the sort of thing an eight-year-old could appreciate; all it did was make Mokuba feel even smaller.

Seto tugged on Mokuba's hand, leading him to the bed where he put down the suitcase.

"Don't worry, Mokuba," he said, helping Mokuba get his backpack off. "It won't seem so bad after a few days."

"Yeah, okay… Seto?" Mokuba began.

"Yes?" Seto was rifling through the suitcase, sorting his own clothes from his brother's, though, there being so little it wouldn't take long.

"Did you know he had a son?" Seto froze.

It was a moment before he answered. He sighed, his shoulders drooping for the first time seemingly since their first meeting with Gozaburo Kaiba.

"No, Mokuba. I didn't have a clue. If I'd known he had, I might have planned things differently." He began sorting again, moving everything he found of Mokuba's off to the edge of the bed, trying not to notice how many holes and tears were in almost every piece.

The orphanage had tried their best, but it was still difficult keeping a group of growing kids up to date with their apparel. "Hand-me-down" was a well-used piece of vocabulary at that place. The clothes Seto was wearing right now probably had had at least a few owners before him, and Mokuba's many more. With the donation Gozaburo had made the day he had come to visit, the orphanage would be able to afford more frequent and more suitable clothing for their tenants. But, as Seto and Mokuba were leaving soon, it had not been seen as so necessary to outfit them with clothes that they'd be taking with them anyway to the person who'd made the given the money in the first place. It was viewed that it would be somewhat like giving his money back to him.

"So you never meant to…" Mokuba trailed off, feeling bad for wanting to ask the question, catching his brother's full attention.

"Never meant to what, Mokuba?"

Mokuba sighed and crawled up onto the pale green comforter covering the bed. He sat, legs hanging over the side of the bed, not meeting his brother's concerned eyes.

"He just didn't seem to like us, you know? I mean, I think I'd feel the same way if… Mom and Dad… had…" Tears were brimming in Mokuba's eyes. Seto watched, letting Mokuba brush away his own tears as they fell down his cheeks, rather than catch them for him.

"H-had they lived, and brought home another kid… I think I would feel…"

"Betrayed," Seto supplemented.

Mokuba sniffled. "Yeah."

"… Mokuba," Seto said, completely serious.

Mokuba looked at him, amethyst eyes still wet and wobbly with unshed tears.

"To avoid being betrayed ourselves, we need to watch our backs here." Mokuba's eyes widened.

"But—"

"I know it seems like things might be over. But, this is not a place that we can relax in. They're watching us, Mokuba. Gozaburo does not want us here, and, now, neither does his real son. If we're not careful, we just might have to leave again, or worse."

"Worse?" Mokuba stared in fright at Seto, who knew he was scaring his baby brother, but needed to make sure that he realized their true situation: they were in the enemy's camp.

"This isn't a place we can call home, Mokuba," Seto intoned.

"Then, why are we even here if we can't be happy?" Mokuba asked, loudly, almost accusatory. Mokuba hadn't even known of Seto's plan that day at the orphanage. Who in their right mind would risk something as huge as finally getting a family on a chess game? …But, then again, both Seto _and_ Gozaburo had done just that, and everyone thought of them as geniuses. Mokuba thought he might do well to start identifying 'genius' with being 'out-of their-ever-loving-mind.'

"…The opportunities, Mokuba. Can't you see them? They're everywhere here." There was an almost fevered look in Seto's eyes. If Mokuba had been more mature, he would have seen it as the altered contortion of what, in an earlier time, had been the light of stimulation and excitement.

"If we play this place and these people right, we can have everything we want, Mokuba. We have the resources and we have the ability." Seto crouched down in front of his brother, taking the child's hands in his own. "Come on, Mokie. There are two of them, and there are two of us. We can make this work."

It was the use of his baby-name that finally pushed Mokuba into nodding his agreement. Seto hadn't used it since the chess match, and it was nice to hear that his older brother wasn't entirely gone through the use of the nickname.

"Thank you, Mokie." Seto squeezed his little brother's hands, and he squeezed back.

Seto stood up. "I have to go now, but I'll be back soon, okay?" He went over and made sure that the little that was left in the suitcase was his before snapping the luggage closed.

"How am I supposed to find you if I need to?" Mokuba asked, panicked, unable to remember the various twists and turns that had led them from Seto's room to his.

Seto, however, called up a precise layout in his mind that accounted for, not only the bends in their path, but also the distance between them all. He suddenly set down the suitcase again and made his way over to the windows, which weren't all entirely windows. One of the windows was actually a door opening to an outside walkway that travelled all around the inner lower Westward Wing of the house.

"Come here, Mokuba," Seto beckoned. Mokuba followed him out onto the terrace. Seto pointed up and to the left. "You see that middle window there, with the white curtains?"

Mokuba nodded. "Uh huh."

"That's my window."

"Really?" Mokuba asked, amazed at how sure his brother was in his answer.

"Yes. I'm going to head back there now, and when I get there, I'll open the window and wave to you, okay? To prove to you that it's mine."

"But, it seems like it would be so easy to get from your room to mine. Why didn't she take us that way if there is an easier one?" Mokuba asked, confused.

"I think she may have purposely been trying to confuse us."

"But, why?" Innocence poured from Mokuba in great waves that Seto would eventually learn not to take for granted.

He shook his head, but he knew the answer. He just didn't want to frighten his brother anymore than he had already today. But, Divide and Conquer was one of the names of the many games in this household. Luckily, for Seto, it seemed like Gozaburo and Noah were already pretty well divided as it was.

_Still_, Seto thought, _Gozaburo's going to be tough enough to take down without another player trying to mess everything up._ Had Gozaburo been alone, Seto might have given him a shot, seen if they could make this father-son thing work out. But, this new development with Noah had put a stop to anything like that ever occurring.

And, besides, Seto understood Gozaburo. He wasn't tough to figure out. He had money, so he looked down on people who didn't, he had power, so he believed himself even further elevated above the masses, but, most importantly, he had _worked_ for his money and his power, so, while his ego swelled to absolute massive proportions, he still had certain values. Seto had already found two of them when he'd challenged Gozaburo to the chess game.

He'd been entertained and fascinated by Seto's seemingly impetuous challenge, as well as by the sheer absurdity of Seto thinking he could win against the world champion of chess. And, even with the blackmail Seto would have if the man had refused to play him, Gozaburo had wanted to play, to reward the boy for taking such a grand chance, if also to punish him for his insolence. Gozaburo approved of gutsy moves. And, when he had lost, Gozaburo had honored his word, something Seto had not actually been expecting.

The man had, amazingly enough, a sort of sense of honor and a respect for those who he saw to be like himself. Seto was fully planning to use both of those facts to his full advantage.

He turned back to Mokuba. "I'm going to look around a bit after I go back to my room. So—"

"But, Anna said to stay in our rooms." Now that he knew that things could get "worse," Mokuba didn't want his brother doing something that could bring that about.

Seto smiled a little. "Don't worry, Mokie. I won't get caught; I never am." He ruffled his brother's hair lovingly before going back into the room, grabbing the suitcase, and leaving his brother by himself.

For a few minutes, Mokuba just stood where he'd been left, staring intently at the window across the way that Seto had pointed out. When he finally saw movement behind the curtains there, Mokuba brightened a bit. And, when the curtains were drawn back and the actual window opened to reveal his brother there, waving at him, Mokuba actually smiled and waved whole-heartedly back.

Not too long after, Seto left the window to do the exploring he said he was going to do, and Mokuba was alone again.

Glumly, he went back into the room he'd been given. With Seto gone, it seemed even more daunting than before. He was exposed on all sides.

He spotted a chair in the far corner of the room, near a door that turned out to lead to the bathroom. He curled up in the chair, hugging his knees to his chest, looking around the rest of the room form his little corner.

He knew that this was what Seto had wanted. What he had said about all the opportunities that being a member of the Kaiba family would provide helped explain a lot to Mokuba.

Admittedly, the orphanage hadn't been the most inspiring of places. They hadn't believed Seto when he'd said he'd already skipped two grades, and even when he'd left all the other kids in what they'd forced to be his class in the dust, they still wouldn't let him more up. So, the academic boost now that they were out of there would most likely be very great. Plus, at the orphanage there wasn't much else to do for someone like Seto when he wasn't in class. Playing with other children had always been tedious to him, even before they'd lost their parents, and it wasn't like the orphanage could afford more interesting toys or anything for someone as bright as Seto. The closest they were ever able to get was the old chessboard some kid had left behind after they'd been adopted. Now that they were in a place like this, Seto might actually be able to find stuff that would amuse him.

But… Mokuba hadn't actually minded being at the orphanage that much. Yeah, the schoolwork had been a tad bit easy, and the selection of toys and stuff to do had been limited. And, there were always at least a few bullies that you'd have to watch out for. Even with all of that, though, Mokuba had made some friends at the orphanage, like with Sister Mary Therese, one of the nuns who'd help run the orphanage. She'd always reminded Mokuba of a mom and had made everything a lot more bearable for him, especially since the worst part of the orphanage had been the thought that, because he was there, that meant no one loved him.

He knew Seto loved him, of course, and Sister Mary Therese had always done her best to make sure all the orphans knew that it wasn't their fault they were there, that they weren't unlovable. Yet, Mokuba had hoped that, when Seto had confessed just days prior to Gozaburo's visit that he had a plan that would get them out of there, it was a plan that would get them into an actually family again, not whatever this was.

Then, there was also that Noah guy. He may have acted like a jerk, but, Mokuba guessed, having in his home two other boys that would now also be considered his father's sons would, in a way, also be a lot like losing his family.

_Not much I can do about it_, Mokuba thought, wrapping himself up even tighter.

But, with Seto off doing whatever and the fear of what might happen if he tried to do the same, what _was_ Mokuba to do?

It had been about an hour since Seto had left Mokuba behind.

He'd decided to first explore the area of the house they'd been sequestered in, to see if there was any point in placing them in the back of the house. Maybe it was an insult, and they were actually in the servant's quarters. Or, possibly, they'd been placed very near Gozaburo's own rooms so that he could keep an eye on them.

Seto doubted the last one, but he figured that there must have been some reason to their being where they were. However, all he found were abandoned rooms and hallways at every turn. So, he decided to move his search forward.

All he was doing was a little simple reconnaissance to get familiar with the area; he didn't have enough experience with the house or the people yet to do anything more specific than that.

As he moved along, some odd memories kept popping up from his time at the orphanage, almost all of them having to do with Sister Mary Therese telling him time after time to get down, or asking where had he been, or even reprimanding him for being somewhere he shouldn't have. He bore the nun no ill will, but she was definitely one of those who'd decided to prevent his skipping grades again, and her constant concern for his whereabouts and what he was doing was grating on the nerves for someone like Seto who wished to be as independent as possible.

He pushed the thoughts to the back of his mind, seeing no use for the sentiments.

He reached the hallway with the windows facing into the courtyard. Rather than sleeping the dogs were restlessly moving about, pacing, occasionally circling the perimeter in the space they were confined within.

The tension reached up from the yard, breaking through the windows and catching Seto's attention, causing him to pause in his steps.

Suddenly, one of the dogs leaped at the other, and a terrifying fight ensued. Or, at least, it appeared to be so as Seto watched, unable to look away as the accompanying wretched sounds made their way up and through the glass panes. It ended when one of the dogs wrestled the other to the ground by its grip on the other's throat, pinning it there, the threat of death hanging over it.

…Then, the dominant dog pulled away, letting the other up, the whole of it having been a mock-fight.

Seto let go a breath he hadn't even realized he'd been holding, seeing that both animals were okay, not even a scratch between them.

_I think I hate dogs._ He moved on quickly after that.

When he reached the balcony in the foyer he tried to decide where to go next. He could either go down and do some more exploring down there, or continue across the way into the Eastward Wing of the house.

While he contemplated the factors involved in each of the choices, he heard voices from downstairs. Three maids, one of them being Anna, were coming into the foyer from the door she had entered through before.

"Just leave a note in his room, Anna," a redhead hissed to the girl. In her arms she was holding a bundle of white clothes. "It won't get back to MR. Kaiba that you forgot. It's not a big deal anyway."

"You can only say it's not a big deal because you weren't the one who forgot," Anna spat back.

It was interesting seeing the true natures of the people who would no doubt be on their best behavior once he showed himself. Carefully, he hid himself behind the railings of the balcony, hoping they were too consumed by their conversation to notice him.

"What are they like, anyway?" the redhead continued. "Do you think they'll make friends with Noah?"

Anna sighed. "I doubt it. The younger's nothing but a wimpy little mouse, and the other's too stubborn for his own good. Besides, you know how advanced Noah is. They'll probably bore him to tears."

Seto was riled immediately at the dismissal of himself. _He_ was the one who was going to be bored to death, not _Noah._ How dare they make such assumptions.

He glaringly watched them make their way to the bottom of the Westward staircase.

"That's enough from both of you," the third maid said, stepping in front of each of them. Taking the garments from the redhead, she handed them to Anna with the instructions, "Now, take these to the newest young master Kaiba's room, and let him know what to expect, alright?"

"But, what if he's not there?" Anna asked, taking the burden.

"You were supposed to tell them to stay in their rooms," the redhead admonished.

"I did! He said something about needing to help his brother unpack, and how was I supposed to say 'no'? He _is_ a Kaiba," Anna defended herself.

"There's only one Kaiba that really matters in this house and that's Gozaburo. Now, get going," the third commanded again.

As Anna made her way up the stairs and the other two disappeared under the balcony, Seto moved stealthily into the Eastward Wing.

Things were getting interesting. The maids actually seemed to like the spoiled brat, but that comment about Gozaburo being the only Kaiba that mattered show they didn't respect him.

_They probably just fear Gozaburo,_ Seto thought. And, now he had something to hold over Anna's head should he need to. In this house, even something as minor as being forgetful could get you punished, it would seem.

_A good thing to keep in mind for later._

Seto continued his way down this new hallway, keeping his eyes and ears open to any sign of servants, turning to the left when he thought he heard something going on in front of him.

"Why are they even here, Father?" The whining question came from around the next corner on the left.

_Noah._

Seto sidled up along the wall. When he came to the corner, he barely peeked around it to find the hall itself empty, but an open door at the end of it not. Through it, he could see Noah leaning over a giant desk, pleading with his father, who himself was turned away, facing a set of windows. Quickly, he made his way silently down the hall and concealed himself behind the door, ready to glean any information that he could from the two Kaibas.

"Noah," Gozaburo growled dangerously. Seeing the other boys had brought out of Noah a sudden viciousness that took even his father by surprise, but Gozaburo was not one to be unsettled in the least by anything, much less his own pathetic son.

"There was no reason to, Father. We were doing so well on our own. You could have just asked me to work harder and I would have." Noah truly believed what he was saying. He'd have done anything to please his father.

"Every second you are here shows me you lack discipline, Noah. That is something you can learn all the quicker by being around Seto," Gozaburo started.

_I'm here to set an example?_ Seto didn't understand. He was here because he earned it, not because he was wanted, right?

"You may be doing well in your studies, but it's your character that's lacking. Your competing with Seto will help to build you up from what you are now into an actual man."

"I'm only twelve, Father," Noah tried to excuse himself.

"Seto's only twelve, and _he_ is already so far beyond you that it sickens me."

"I will do better, Father," Noah vowed.

"You'd better, Noah. And, to ensure that you do, I'm keeping Seto. When you can prove you don't need him to be an adult, then I will consider getting rid of him."

"B-but—"

"No 'but's'. Get out, Noah. This is the end of this conversation."

There was a long, quiet minute before Seto heard the shuffling footsteps signaling Noah's departure.

Seto watched Noah's departing back intently as it retreated down the hall.

"I will not be the one who is used," Seto said to himself.

Thinking he heard something, Noah turned back to look at his father's study door.

But, there was nothing there. He must have imagined it.

Hearing a sound behind him, Gozaburo turned around, saying, "I thought I told you to leave, Noah."

But it wasn't Noah whom he found there.

Seto stood just inside the doorway, off to one side so as not to be framed by it. Through the door, Noah could be seen turning the corner to go back to his room at the front of the house.

"And, exactly where were you hiding?" Gozaburo was being unhappily reminded of when he'd thought he'd finally gotten a chance to leave that wretched orphanage place, only to have this boy and his little brother step into his way.

Seto, eyes the same color as Noah's, just stared at Gozaburo.

"Don't think you can try to unnerve me, kiddo. You won't succeed," Gozaburo warned him as he took his seat behind his desk.

The boy continued staring. And, while it wasn't enough to actually upset or alarm Gozaburo, it had a better chance of doing so than any of Noah's tantrums over the years combined.

"Have a seat, Seto." He gestured to a chair before the desk.

Slowly, Seto accepted the offer, and then he began. "First, I don't get to know you have a son. Second, it turns out I'm suddenly a plaything for this son to cut his teeth on, as it were… What next, Gozaburo?"

"And, what makes you think you were entitled to any of that knowledge in the first place?"

Gozaburo watched as Seto's feathers became ruffled and as he searched in vain for any reason as to why he should have been informed.

The man chuckled and stood up. "I like you, Seto. You're not afraid to get your hands dirty and you're willing to go all in on a bet. But, there's something you don't seem to quite grasp about the art of gambling." Gozaburo walked around the desk to stand in front of Seto, where he leaned down, and brought them faced to face. "You have to be sure that what you're asking for is something worth winning. And, by that I mean that it's something the other person doesn't want to give up.

"I need you here to teach my son the value of being in competition with someone, I need you here to better with him. And, if you cannot provide that, it's back to the orphanage you go." The smirk on Gozaburo's face made Seto's skin feel dirty.

"If you send me back, I'll tell everyone that you lost to a kid," Seto threatened him, reminding him of their deal.

Gozaburo threw his head back and laughed. The laugh was rather forced and his posture very stiff, but the fact that he was laughing at all had Seto on high alert.

Wiping a nonexistent tear from his eye, Gozaburo said, "Oh, Seto. You do make me laugh." He added in one final chortle. "Do you really believe that it will be so easy to convince people that the world champion lost to an unknown kid, practically living off the streets?"

"Yes," Seto defiantly snapped.

"Then, you're more a fool than I thought you were." Things were serious again. Gozaburo moved back to sit behind the desk.

"You will stay for as long as I permit, which is as long as you challenge Noah to become superior to yourself. The moment he surpasses you, you're gone."

"Even you don't quite realize what you're doing, do you?" Seto asked, seeing before him certain implications that he wasn't sure the old man had seen.

"I'm playing the game a bit by ere, I suppose you could say. But, since it's my game, I don't see anything to worry about." Gozaburo leaned back in his seat, completely sure that nothing could go wrong with his plans.

"What if Noah doesn't "surpass" me? What if, along the way, I break him?" Seto wondered through gritted teeth, trying to keep himself from flying off the handle. How could he have been in control the entire time, only to now find out that it was all a lie?

"Hm. The thing I don't think you realize yet, Seto, is that you are now a Kaiba only by name. Noah is a Kaiba by blood, and that means he will always surpass the competition."

"We'll see." Seto stood up and immediately left the room after he said that.

He was _seething_. A Kaiba _by name_? He'd earned that name thank you very much, and to hell if he wasn't going to be making it his own.

He was Seto Kaiba, and no one was going to tell him otherwise.

Rounding the corner, he came face to face with a waiting Noah.

The teal-haired boy smile-snarled. "I knew it. You were listening in, you stupid orphan."

"Isn't it funny how your father doesn't consider the orphan to be the stupid one?" Seto retorted, trying to move around the brat, not having the patience for this first encounter with his new brother.

"Hey!" Noah caught his arm as Seto walked by, not realizing how close Seto was to smashing something, possibly Noah's nose. "You have no idea what's going on in this house. But, I do, because it's _my _house. Do you understand?"

"Do you?" Seto suddenly asked, staring the other boy in the eye.

"Uh… Of course! It's _my_ house! With _my_ family."

"Give me a break." Seto tried to walk past again, but Noah wouldn't let him go.

"You don't belong here. Even my father believes that. You're just here for a limited time. _On rent._ The moment we're done with you, you, and that pathetic little brother of yours, are gone. So, don't get used to it here. It's only a matter of time before you're back in that orphanage."

Having finished, Noah hurried off, going as fast as he could to avoid any comeback Seto might throw after at him. But, he needn't have worried.

Seto stood in the hall for several minutes after Noah left. When he began walking again, it was like he was in a trance. He went all the way back to his room like this, past the balcony, past the dogs, not even thinking to check in on Mokuba. He'd panic him with the mood he was in, especially if he had to explain why he was in the mood in the first place.

He got to his room and walked in for the first time, not noticing a damn thing about it. Well, he noticed the marvelous _cracking_ sound the door made when he'd slam it with all the strength an enraged twelve-year-old could manage. He looked back once to make sure he hadn't actually fractured the wood, but then just stood in the room for a minute, trying to calm the screaming inside his mind.

He would not be used. And, yet, that's exactly what they were doing with him. He was an instruction tool for that brat to learn from, and, once, he'd learned, he'd be cast off.

_And, Mokuba would be cast off too._

_No! _

Seto wasn't about to let Mokuba go through that again, the atmosphere of abandonment that had pervaded the orphanage. He knew his little brother had struggled with the idea of being unwanted, unloved. And, maybe, if he were a better older brother, he would have let Mokuba be adopted into one of those families who had seen his cuteness, his purity, and let him have the family he'd wanted. But, Seto wasn't ready to give up his little brother, even though he'd known that the only way they'd ever get out together was if some rich person ever came to the orphanage.

And, he had, and Seto had taken full advantage of the opportunity. _He_ was the one using Gozaburo back then, not the other… way… around…

_Revenge_. 

That was really what it was all about Seto realized suddenly. Gozaburo and he were, and Seto hated admitting this, a lot alike. Neither appreciated being someone else's pawn, and when they caught the person using them, they made sure to punish them to the greatest extent they could.

Some might consider that what Gozaburo was doing to be fair-play, that he and Gozaburo would be even once it was over. But, they were wrong. Seto had plans for Gozaburo now, and the hell if the old man would get a chance to get vengeance for _those_ when Seto was done with him.

And, as for Noah…

Seto finally noticed something that was somewhat odd about his room. There was a bundle of white clothes stacked neatly on a dresser on the other side of the room.

Seto walked over to find a note atop the bundle. Anna must have decided to repair the damage she hadn't really even done, exactly like Seto had overheard.

It was a dainty little card, like the place cards used at fancy dinner parties with delicate, raised scrollwork around the edge. Inside the border it was addressed to "Young Master Kaiba."

Smirking at the over-doneness of the card, Seto flipped it open and read the contents.

'_Young Master Kaiba, I forgot to mention before that Mr. Gozaburo Kaiba wishes for you and your brother to be outfitted with a full wardrobe of clothes each. In two days' time, I will take you both to the family tailor in order to complete this directive. Please be prepared on that day to leave an hour after lunch. Until then, I have left some little used clothes of Noah's that might fit you for you to wear. Anna.'_

Seto raised a brow at the formality of the note, especially after he'd seen her true self earlier, and it was nothing like the card suggested. "Young Master Kaiba," he muttered to himself. He'd expected things to be more proper in the house of a man who could afford manners, but this was ridiculous.

_She must be trying to suck up to avoid my mentioning receiving the information late._

Tossing the card over his shoulder, Seto grabbed the top article of clothing to find a white, long-sleeved shirt with gold embroidery around the collar and cuffs.

It ticked him off to have to resort to using another person's clothing, but, as it would tick Noah off more, he decided he'd bear it. For now.

In two days, he would have his own "full wardrobe," and if that didn't say a lot, he wasn't sure what did.

"Looks like everyone else thinks I'm going to be around for a while, Noah."

**Thank you for reading!**

**I came in about a thousand words short than what I wanted, but, seeing as I was just barely able to get this out the day I said I would, I think I won't let it bug me too much. Ten thousand words was just an approximate goal, anyway. Nine thousand is just as good.**

**The next chapter will hopefully be posted on November 27th, 2010. I hope to see you then!**


	2. Is This the Life?

**This chapter was re-uploaded November 28th, 2010, after I realized all my breaks had once again been deleted.**

**Hello, everyone! I actually got chapter two out when I said I would, huzzah! Anyway, thank you to those who reviewed.**

**Just a little tidbit I thought might be interesting to some people: Has anyone heard the song "Unwanted" by Avril Lavigne? My iPod was on shuffle while I was writing this second chapter, and that song came on. I was looking over the first chapter as well as I wrote this, and the parallels between the song and Seto's experiences in the first chapter kind of amazed me, especially since I hadn't listened to the song in what seems like years. **

**Chapter Two: Is This the Life?**

"Noah… _Noah!_" Gozaburo snapped, finally capturing the boy's attention.

The boy jumped. "Yes, Father," he answered quickly, ducking his head to escape the glare he was being given.

Gozaburo glared a moment more at his son before continuing, "After breakfast, you will show Seto to the classroom where he will begin his studies at your side. You will also give him a breakdown of the schedule here, so that he won't be late for anything. Any questions?"

…

"What about Mokuba?" the boy across the table from Noah asked.

Noah turned his face to glower at Seto. The glower became even more twisted as Noah once again took in the sight of the interloper wearing _his_ clothes. Last night, when the orphans had been brought into the dining room for supper, Noah had just about lost it in front of his father when he had seen Seto wearing the white and gold outfit that Noah had just recently spurned as being unfit for his own self. He'd tried to comfort himself with the thought that, since Seto was to be second-best in this house, he only deserved to have Noah's cast-off, unwanted clothes…

Except when he'd seen Seto wearing them, he'd suddenly wanted _his_ clothes back.

"I am still looking for a suitable tutor for Mokuba," Gozaburo, obviously put out by the idea of needing a tutor for the little one at all. "Until then, he can wander the house and the yards or whatever, as long as he doesn't get in the way of yours and Noah's studies." He took a gulp of coffee. "Or, with anyone else's business. I won't have him underfoot."

"I…" Everyone turned in surprise at the sound of Mokuba's voice. He froze for a moment, but after feeling his brother nudging him under the table, he gathered his courage and started, "I could just go to a normal school… if that would be… easier…" Mokuba lowered his eyes, blushing.

"That is totally out of the question," Gozaburo barked at the preposterousness of the suggestion, causing all three sons to flinch, Seto the least, Mokuba the most. "A Kaiba in a public school? As Kaiba's, we are above the public. We are above even the elite, so don't try to convince me of any private preparatory school either. Kaiba's are to be specialized and cultured separately from the rest of society. We are better than them."

"Yes, of course we are," Noah confirmed, looking to his father for approval. But, Gozaburo was glaring at Mokuba for his simplicity, who was looking at Seto for some guidance, who was rolling his eyes at Noah's attempt to gain his daddy's love. Noah caught the eye-rolling.

"Hey! What do you know about anything, orphan-brat? You don't even belong here!" Noah snarled, ready to fly across the table at the interloping new boy.

"Noah!" Gozaburo reprimanded at full volume.

Noah froze, huddling in on himself, glaring at his plate.

_Interesting_, Seto thought, observing another in what was already a series of incidences where Gozaburo became displeased with his son. _Were they always like this? Or, is it because of me?_

"…So, when do our lessons begin?" Seto asked Gozaburo, sure that if he asked Noah directly the boy really would leap at him, but he nevertheless want4ed to be prepared for his day. No doubt Noah would try to lead him astray the first chance he got.

"Noah, explain your lessons to him," Gozaburo commanded, done with this family business. He grabbed the newspaper a servant had set out for him and used it to block out the sight of his sons.

Noah sighed and mumbled to himself, unwilling to continue. But, when Gozaburo lowered the paper to raise a thunderous eyebrow at the teal-head, Noah finally spoke up, continuing to look only at his plate. "At eight we meet with Mr. Farnsworth for English. At ten, we go to Mr. Bonoducchi for music lessons. Lunch is at noon. At one, it's Mr. Harding for mathematics, then, at three, he switches to science. Five to six is break, six is dinner, and seven is back to Mr. Farnsworth for history until nine," Noah finished up glumly.

"You guys work until nine at night?" Mokuba asked, eyes wide, mind boggled.

"Isn't that what I just said?" Noah sniped sarcastically.

"I believe my little brother's just surprised that your little brain hasn't exploded yet from all that work," Seto quipped back, not about to let Noah get in the habit of insulting _his _little brother.

Noah opened his mouth to respond when Gozaburo interrupted with, "Noah, go gather your things for your first lesson. I'll have Anna take Seto to his first class."

"It's only seven thirty, Father," Noah argued.

"Go."

Slowly slinking out of his chair, never taking his burning eyes off of Seto, Noah silently and angrily left the room.

The breakfast room fell into silence.

"When can we expect a tutor for Mokuba?" Seto returned to the earlier subject, directing the words at Gozaburo.

"When I find one for him. It's not like I have limitless time to devote to such things," Gozaburo gruffly answered, ruffling the pages of his paper. "Sometime within the next couple of weeks will be soon enough."

Wondering if he might be pushing it, Seto asked, "Why don't you get Noah's mother to do to for you?"

The old man stiffened. Mokuba's eyes darted between his brother and the newspaper hiding the expression of their adoptive father. He and Seto had talked briefly last night about why they'd seen no evidence of a Mrs. Kaiba, but Mokuba had never expected his brother to tackle the issue so bluntly, without any tact at all.

"I do not ask Noah's mother because she and I recently divorced one another," the newspaper shielded man said.

_Why?_

"Why?" Mokuba's eyes were bugging out of his head at the sudden demanding tone in Seto's voice. Didn't he know when to let something go? Mokuba had always thought his brother was smarter than this.

The newspaper slowly dropped and suddenly Gozaburo was on his feet, eyes closed.

"Mrs. Kaiba and I divorced after she found out I had made the decision to adopt two children from the orphanage across town. I suppose she just didn't care too much for the idea of brining in two more burdens. Anna!"

"Yes, sir," the maid said, stepping forward from where she'd been positioned against the wall.

"Take the boys back to their rooms until before eight. Then, fetch Seto to his lessons, understood?"

"Yes, Mr. Kaiba." She bowed briefly.

Gozaburo opened and directed his eyes briefly to the two brothers. "Good day, boys." It sounded threatening.

"Later, Pops," Seto sneered back fearlessly. Mokuba just sat and stared as Gozaburo briskly left the room.

Anna took a few steps forward.

"There's no need for that, Anna," Seto stopped her, standing from his seat at the table, Mokuba scrambling to do the same. "We can make our way back on our own.

"Oh, but—" The boys were already making their way to the opposite door that Gozaburo had used.

"I'll be in Mokuba's room when you need to get me," Seto informed her, ignoring her mild protesting.

"Um, yes, sir," Anna answered, still standing in the center of the room, somewhat dazed.

Seto closed the door to the breakfast room, cutting Mokuba and himself off from the rest of the house.

"What did you think you were doing?" Mokuba asked once they were alone.

Seto motioned for his little brother to follow him and answered as they walked. "I wanted to make sure we didn't get another bombshell dropped on us. It was best to just straight out ask than wait for it to slip somehow. Besides," Seto added under his breath, "he deserved it."

"But, couldn't you have been nicer about it? I mean, you were kind of cruel back there," Mokuba said, unsure of who exactly this person claiming to be his bother really was.

Seto looked down at his brother, caching the look of uncertainty and mild censure.

"I'm mad about something Gozaburo did, Mokuba. I wanted to pay him back for it," Seto admitted, not wanting his baby brother thinking badly of him.

"You mean about how he didn't tell us about Noah?" Mokuba's face scrunched up in a small, confused frown.

"No. It's something else he did." Seto sighed harshly through his nose. "I can't tell you about it right now, okay? I'm still too angry, and I need to tell you about this when I'm calm and can explain it better. Will you wait a few days for me to cool off a little?" Seto asked his brother.

"Well, sure I will. But, is it really bad?" Mokuba asked worriedly, a silent fear showing through his deep amethyst eyes.

"It's nothing I can't handle," Seto responded, making sure his own confidence in his abilities showed in his own strong, cobalt eyes. Mokuba looked for a moment before nodding, a tiny smile on his lips.

He'd trusted his brother to get them here, and he wasn't about to stop trusting him yet.

Seto smiled a little in return. "Thanks, Mokie."

Mokuba's smile widened and he reached up and took his brother's hand. They made their way back to Mokuba's room hand-in-hand.

Once there, Seto closed the door behind them and Mokuba made his way to the bed.

"I forgot to ask if you slept well last night," Seto said.

"Mm, it was okay. It felt odd having so much room to stretch out in." It had felt odd to have so much room, period. Several times Mokuba had been tempted to go over to the chair he'd sat in yesterday in the corner and just sleep there, and several more times, he'd been tempted to leave his room and make his way over to Seto's. It wasn't _that_ far away, after all. But, he'd remembered Seto talking to him yesterday about what they would have to do to survive here and the underlying message that they'd have to grow up to do so. So, instead of running to his brother as he might have done at the orphanage, or even at their home, Mokuba had made it a test for himself to stay in his bed all night. And, in the morning, after a fitful night of tossing and turning and reminding himself of the challenge to himself… he hadn't felt one bit better about having succeeded in his goal.

He sighed quietly to himself. He guessed he just wasn't up to the whole over-coming-the-odds thing like Seto was.

"What do you think you're going to do today?" Seto asked, moving around the room, picking up the clothes that Mokuba had left scattered from yesterday, realizing that there were maids for that sort of things, but preferring to do it himself. Mokuba was still using the clothes from the orphanage, none of Noah's having been kept from when he was that age and size, and making Mokuba stick out like a sore thumb from everyone else, dressed in their posh, expensive threads.

"I don't know. I think I'd like to get better acquainted with this area of the house, at least, so I don't get lost," Mokuba threw out there, not having any other ideas.

"That's a good idea." Seto found the clothes hamper behind the bathroom door and tossed his brother's garments in there, briefly wondering if he should save the staff the trouble and throw them out himself. Nah, let them do a little work for their paycheck.

"Maybe you could find the kitchen after you're done looking around here?" Seto suggested.

"The kitchen? Why?" Mokuba didn't see the point.

"Midnight snacks, missed meals, that sort of thing."

"Oh. Okay, I'll look. But, what if I get in their way, like Gozaburo said he didn't want me doing?" Mokuba wondered, not wanting to be the first of them to get in trouble in this new place. "I mean, if I was just going to ignore what he said, I'd just follow you around all day."

"He would notice that, though. He probably wasn't even thinking of the kitchen when he told you to stay out of people's ways. He most likely just meant himself." Seto sat down on the bed beside Mokuba.

"He works at home?" Mokuba definitely hadn't gotten that impression. He seemed more the type to _never_ be home.

"No. He has a building in the middle of downtown that he works at. I heard him tell the orphanage's director that he was going to take a few days off to get us used to our new home. Until the orphanage sent their inspector for the check-up they have to do."

"I didn't know they did a check-up. When will they be coming? Do you know who? _How _do you know?" Mokuba asked the last question suspiciously.

"Any day now they should be here. They don't let the day be known to make sure the adopters don't make everything seem nice on that day alone. And, they don't let the reviewer be known either for similar reasons. And, _I_ know because I have the luck of walking past open doorways that always seem to have interesting conversations going on inside of them." Seto had a roguish smile on at the last comment.

"You don't believe in luck," Mokuba called him out, a twinkle in his own eyes.

"I believe in making my own luck," Seto countered, his smile becoming even more mischievous and wicked. Mokuba actually let out a laugh.

"Okay. So, kitchen patrol."

"Only if you find the time. And, don't forget that lunch is at noon and dinner at six."

"Yeah, 'kay, I get it." Mokuba rolled his eyes at his brother's attempt at parenting. Seto ruffled his hair in retaliation.

"Seto?" Mokuba was suddenly serious.

"Yeah?" Seto responded warily, having the feeling he wasn't going to like what was coming next.

"Could you try to be nice to Noah? Please?" Mokuba pleaded, looking sideways over at his big brother.

Seto became still. "Why?"

"It's just that a lot has happened to him, it seems, and I don't want him to think that our coming here is one of those things." Mokuba was playing with his hands in his lap, not really wanting to know what was showing on Seto's face at the moment.

"A lot has happened to us, too. Do you think he feels the same way about it?" Seto slowly suggested, not wanting to come down hard on Mokuba with a straight-out refusal.

"Maybe not, but none of what has happened to us was his fault. It looks like all the bad things that have happened in Noah's life recently are because we came into it: his parents' divorce, his having to share his home and his dad. To tell the truth, I'd be surprised if he didn't hate us."

Seto looked down at his little brother, proud of him for the insight he was showing, but worried as well. Empathy was a good thing, Seto supposed, but too much of it could do just as much harm to you as the person you were feeling for.

"Mokuba, the thing that I'm going to tell you about soon, the thing that I'm mad at Gozaburo because of?" Mokuba nodded, bemused, wondering where this was going. "When I tell you about it, it's going to show you how a lot of what is happening to Noah right now is his own fault, at least in some ways, as well as his father's fault. It's not all on us, Mokuba."

"Really?" The guilt Mokuba was feeling slipped through.

_Damn you, Gozaburo,_ Seto thought, hating that the little speech he'd given at breakfast before leaving had taken effect on his little brother.

"Really. You can't take everything at face value here, understand? It will only confuse you as to what's actually going on."

Mokuba frowned. "I don't know if I can do that."

"I'll do it for us," Seto said, placing a comforting hand on his brother's shoulder. "It's almost eight. I'll see you at lunch, okay?"

"Okay." A knocking came from the door.

"Yes?" Seto called.

"Sir, it's time I took you to your first class," Anna shouted back through the door.

Seto took in and released a readying breath of air, preparing for his first real day within the Kaiba house and family. "Right. Later, Mokie."

"Bye. Have fun," Mokuba wished half-heartedly. Seto sent him a small, understanding smile over his shoulder before opening the door and closing his little brother off from him.

* * *

Anna led him back the way she'd taken them the day before to get to their rooms, making her way to the Eastward Wing. As they passed the courtyard, Seto noticed that it was devoid of inhabitants.

"Where are the dogs, Anna?" Seto asked, concerned about being in the same house as the two dogs he'd seen fighting yesterday if the beasts were loose.

"Mr. Kaiba chose to take a tour of the grounds with them, sir," Anna responded distantly.

"If you had to guess, where would they all be and how long would they be out?" Seto pushed.

"Oh, um, I'd guess either the rose gardens in the back or the drive to the front gates, sir. As to how long, I couldn't say." Seto speculated as to how long it had taken Anna to cultivate such a proper personality when she acted like your average person when not in the company of a Kaiba.

"When you're done escorting me to the classroom, go back and tell my brother not to go exploring the grounds until the dogs are back in their courtyard," Seto ordered, wondering if, almost hoping that, she would refuse. It would be the perfect chance to exercise the Kaiba name.

"… uh, alright, yes, sir," Anna answered hesitatingly.

"But, sometimes Mr. Kaiba chooses to keep them with him throughout the day, so they may be indoors, but not confined within the courtyard," she explained.

"Then, keep watch. Once they're inside, let my brother know he can go out, and also inform him as to where they are in the house so that he can avoid them," Seto spelled out. The brutes weren't getting as much as a single chance to harm Mokuba if Seto could help it. "Does the old man have control over the mongrels?"

"Of course he has control over Fu Xi and Nu Wa! They wouldn't be here if he didn't." She almost seemed affronted. "And, while they may not like many people, they're both very restrained dogs," she defended.

_Yeah, sure_. Nothing would convince Seto that they were in any way safe after the display he had seen yesterday. "As long as you keep the cats away they're restrained, right?" Seto joked, throwing a curve-ball at the maid.

Anna looked down, surprised at the sudden shift in the boy's personality. She felt her lips twitch and a light, unintentional laugh escape through them. "Erm, yes. Cats would be a problem."

And, Seto had her. He'd needed a least one person on his side besides his brother in this house, and Anna was that one. And, if Mokuba could find the kitchen and make friends with some of the staff there, he could go after them next. He doubted either Noah or Gozaburo would think to create allies within the house with people that low on the serving totem pole, so they were perfect for Seto's plan.

Anna finally left him at a set of double doors in a far corner of the Eastward Wing.

Seto pushed the doors open, and even he was impressed at what he saw waiting for him.

"Whoa." It was designed in the style of a college auditorium: ascending rows of wooden benches divided in half by a walkway leading up to the doors where Seto was standing, giant black chalkboards on the walls in the pit of the auditorium, and even one lone student already in his seat in the fourth row up from the bottom, center-left.

Seto stared at the back of Noah's head for several moments before making his way down the steps. He stopped on the level equal to where Noah was sitting, looking over and waiting for some sort of response. Noah's eyes remained steadfastly glued to the open text book he had in front of him, doing his best to show the new kid that he hadn't taken notice of him. Seto continued to watch until he finally noticed a visible sign of Noah's uneasiness. He found t when a muscle in Noah's jaw began to spastically jump several moments later.

Satisfied, Seto moved down to the second level, taking the third seat in, and sat to wait for the lesson to begin. So far, there was no sign of a tutor anywhere except the day's date written in girlish cursive script on the middle blackboard.

They'd been sitting silently for several minutes before Seto heard a noise two rows behind him. It was the sound of someone standing.

_Stay relaxed,_ Seto told himself as he listened to Noah's steps making their way to the walkway and down to Seto's level.

"So, Seto," Noah slimily began. Seto turned his head slightly to the side, seeing Noah standing with his arms behind his back, not actually looking at the brunette. "What grade were you in before you came here?"

Seto almost laughed at what Noah was trying to do. "At the orphanage or before?"

Noah's brows crumpled a little. He hadn't expected the boy to be so open about the orphanage. "Both."

"At the orphanage they put me in the seventh grade to be with my "peers." Before, I was already in high school."

Noah's eye twitched. "Really?" If he was telling the truth, Seto wouldn't be too far behind Noah himself.

"Really."

Slowly, Noah lowered himself into the aisle seat, making sure to keep a single seat between them. "Hm. It must have been annoying, lowering your standards to accommodate others _less_ than you."

_We're finally getting somewhere._ "Indeed."

Neither boy was looking at the other. Both had their eyes closed, faces directed away from the other, each trying to give the impression of "suave."

"Then, I guess what I'm wondering is why, if you were annoyed by it, you yourself are forcing the same to happen to another person," Noah let drop, an edge creeping into his voice.

The teal-headed boy was completely caught off guard by Seto's laughter. He turned his head, shattering his polished exterior, to see Seto in a position he'd seen his father in many times: legs crossed, arms crossed, and smirk in place.

"And, here I thought you were going to apologize for holding _me_ back," Seto commented, seemingly off-handedly. "I guess we all have our different perspectives," Seto sighed.

Noah was peeved now, but Seto needed something more than that. He needed to be sure that, if he should need to, he could control Noah's reactions. And, he was about to lay the bait for a much larger explosion than simply playing dumb would give him.

Again, he forced a laugh. "I mean, come on, I have to wear _your_ clothes," Seto chuckled.

He heard the rapid inhale of air Noah took in and finally turned his head to face the other boy. Noah's face was bright red and he looked as if he were about to explode.

"If that's the way you feel, take off my clothes and go back to your orphan rags!" Noah spat.

"What's the matter, Noah? Feel like I'm taking your place by wearing your clothes?" Seto goaded, seeing how far he could push the other boy.

"How dare you? Didn't I explain it to you before? You're on rent!"

"Then, why does it bug you so much that I'm wearing these?" Seto tugged at the collar of his shirt.

"Because, you don't deserve them! Now, take them _off_!" he screamed.

"Boys!" a wobbly voice called down from above.

Both Seto and Noah looked up to find a hunched over old man making his way down the walkway.

"Mr. Farnsworth," Noah greeted, standing up from his seat. Seto was momentarily amazed at how quickly Noah had switched from being on the verge of violence to the epitome of likable.

"Good morning, Noah," Mr. Farnsworth responded, pasting on a fake smile to address his employer's son with. "How are you today?" he asked, completely overlooking the near-fight he'd walked in on.

"I'm alright," Noah responded cheerfully. Seto actually felt his jaw drop open in shock. _And, I thought I was a good liar._

"Merely 'alright'?" Mr. Farnsworth pushed, setting a bag down on a table set up on the floor of the auditorium.

"Well…" Noah looked over his shoulder at Seto. Mr. Farnsworth took notice.

"Oh, yes. The new boy. Come down here, boy, come down here." Mr. Farnsworth waved him over.

Seto stood up and, moving around Noah, went to stand beside the table the tutor was working over.

"And, what's your name, boy?" the teacher asked.

"Seto."

"Seto? That doesn't seem like much of a name," the tutor commented, glancing up to look over his new pupil.

In his gaze, Seto caught the scorn there. Mr. Farnsworth was used to teaching the best of the best, not when it came to intelligence, but when it came to class.

"It's better than no name at all," Seto gritted back. Behind him, he heard Noah giggling.

"Mm, yes, I suppose," Farnsworth dismissed, turning back to his bag. He pulled out a stack of books. "Here. Read these sometime soon and let me know what you got out of them."

Seto looked over the titles. "These are children's' books," he said stiffly.

"They're age-appropriate," Farnsworth responded.

Seto slammed them onto the table, catching Farnsworth off guard, making him jump. "What is Noah reading?" Seto demanded to know.

"Noah is above your average—"

"Do you honestly think that Gozaburo would adopt someone who wasn't above-average?" Seto questioned, eyebrow raised, stumping the tutor.

"W-Well…" Farnsworth stumbled.

"Just give me Noah's assignments. If I don't catch up, then, it's my fault. I'll talk to the old man about it should it come down to it. Until then, do try to treat me like I have a brain," Seto civilly snarled.

"Oh, um, but—"

"Give him the assignments," a sonorous voice said from the upper levels. Looking up, Seto, Noah, and Farnsworth saw Gozaburo standing in the doorways, his two Chow Chows to either side of him.

"Yes, Mr. Kaiba!" Farnsworth called up to him, putting on another smile to show the boss. But, it was all for not, since Gozaburo's eyes were devoted to Seto, who was staring right back unabashedly. The same atmosphere as the chess match had crept in again, catching Seto and Gozaburo in a silent struggle while excluding the tutor and Noah.

"You have a month to be at the same level as Noah, Seto, that's it. Can you handle it?"

"Of course."

* * *

"Nice to meet you, Seto. I'm Bono." The man in front of Seto held out his hand in a perfectly genteel manner.

"'Bono'?" Seto questioned, the corner of his lips twitching up.

"Well, obviously not _that_ Bono," the music tutor responded, his own thin lips curling up. "Can't say U2 is my favorite band, either. Not bad, though. What about you, any favorite or hated bands?"

"Not really."

It was ten in the morning, and time for their music lesson with Mr. Bonoducchi. They'd moved to a room in the upper levels of the Northward Wing. Noah was in an adjacent room practicing on the violin he'd been playing since he was seven. Seto didn't like to admit it, but this might be one area where Noah may be better than him.

But, with "Bono" to help him, Seto thought he just might be able to make it.

"What about instruments? Anything interest you there?" Bono pushed casually, leaning against the wall behind him.

"…My mom tried to teach me piano when I was younger," Seto admitted, trying to be just as casual with the touchy subject of his past.

"Tried?"

Seto laughed quietly to himself. "Well, we had a computer in the same room as the piano, and the piano keys kept reminding me of the keys of the computer's keyboard, so…"

"You're the techie type?" Bono wanted to know.

"When I get the chance to be."

"Well, let's just stick with piano. Do you remember your scales?" Bono stood up from the wall and made his way to the piano in the opposite corner of the room.

"Yes," Seto said, following.

"Would you mind sitting down and playing them for me?" Bono gestured to the bench.

Seto paused before sitting down. "I'll play if you tell me why I have to."

Bono's eyes widened, then, he just laughed. "You play while I talk," he compromised.

Seto sat down and began.

"Mr. Kaiba wanted, originally, for his son to be well-rounded in all the areas he could be, and music was just one of those areas, so I was brought in. Make sure to keep your wrists up. You have to play because Mr. Kaiba wants you also to be well-rounded. There's even talk that I might start teaching your little brother, as well, to make sure he doesn't become the single complacent one of the family."

"Hn. 'In all the areas he could be'? What else was Noah taught in?" Seto prodded, taking his eyes from the keys and meeting Bono's green ones.

"This and that. Gozaburo phased out a lot that he deemed to be not so useful, or that just wasn't necessary anymore. Noah likes the violin and you needed the instruction, so that's why I've stuck around when everyone else has gone."

"What? You don't like my playing?" Seto challenged.

"You're not exactly Mozart," Bono said, wincing and twisting a finger in his ear. "But, we can work on it." Bono stood up to his full height. "Move over and I'll start by showing you how to play the scales _properly._"

* * *

By the time lunch rolled around, Seto was well on his way to mastering the scales.

Lunch was in the breakfast room again. And, this time, the dogs were in attendance.

Anna had done as she was told and informed Mokuba of the areas to avoid throughout the morning so as to stay away from the dogs. So, when Mokuba had arrived early to the breakfast room to make doubly sure that he wasn't late to lunch, he'd almost turned right around and left after seeing the giant red balls of fuzz… with teeth.

"Come in here, Mokuba," Gozaburo had called to him, noticing the child standing frozen in the doorway.

Even though Seto hadn't given Mokuba any instructions to avoid being alone with Gozaburo, Mokuba felt that his brother probably wouldn't be happy to find him alone with the old man. But, what was he to do?

Slowly, Mokuba made his way inside the room and to the chair he'd used that morning. One of the dogs, smaller than the other, though not by much, lifted its head from where it had been resting on the ground at its master's feet as Mokuba made his way closer.

Mokuba paused when he noticed the movement.

"Well, come on, boy. Introduce yourself to them," Gozaburo ordered, noticing where the nervous child's attention was. "Nu Wa won't bite you unless I tell her to. Just hold your hand out and let her come to you."

_This should be interesting_, Gozaburo thought to himself. Gozaburo wasn't much interested in the younger boy at all, especially since he seemed to take orders from his brother. But, if he was useful at anything, Gozaburo wanted to know first off. _He could be useful if his brother ever gets out of line._

Slowly, trembling, Mokuba reached out a hand to the Chow Chow nearest him. Nu Wa was suspicious at first, not trusting the outsider, but she was more curious than her brother and eventually stretched out her think neck to sniff at the proffered appendage. When she yawned, showing off her great, black tongue, Mokuba quickly retreated his hand.

Gozaburo was about to smirk, but didn't when Mokuba reached back for more after Nu Wa had closed her mouth again.

_Kid has guts._ The thought was enforced when the child actually knelt down and reached out to gently run his hand through the dog's ruff. What amazed Gozaburo even more was that Nu Wa was allowing the treatment.

"Just you remember, boy, these dogs aren't for play, so don't get too comfortable around them. It's only because she's tired, understand?" Gozaburo gruffly informed the child. "And, don't even think of bringing in any other animals. These two will rip one apart right before your eyes, got it?"

"Yes, sir," the child confirmed quietly.

The door to the breakfast room opened.

"Mokuba?" Seto asked, mildly confused at seeing his brother in a place where Seto had expressly told him not to be: near the dogs.

"Hey, Seto," Mokuba said, quickly standing up. "How were your classes?"

"Fine."

The boy actually had the nerve to give Gozaburo a reprimanding look for allowing Mokuba near the dogs.

_You don't have as great a control over your brother as you think, Seto._

* * *

"And, what level of math were you in before?" Mr. Harding asked slowly, dully, eyes at half-mast behind his coke-bottle glasses.

"Geometry," Seto responded, irritated by the slow pace the tutor was setting. Couldn't Gozaburo afford better than the crotchety old men he had teaching his and Noah's core subjects?

"Well, that will put you at the same level as Noah, then."

Noah was bristling at the thought in his seat back in the fourth row of the auditorium after lunch.

"Take these books. Mr. Kaiba informed me that you had two weeks to catch up. We'll be on chapter sixteen by then, so do what you have to in class, and we'll see where you are then, and if you can start to work with Noah at that time."

"Got it." Seto turned back and made his way to his seat in the second row, ignoring the glare Noah was giving to him from above.

They hadn't spoken since earlier that morning when they'd had their confrontation. Now Seto was wondering if it was really worth riling Noah up like that just to see if he could. Mokuba had asked him to be nice to the kid, but then Seto thought about who the kid was and how Noah acted, and he just couldn't feel guilty for it. It was for a purpose anyway.

* * *

Mokuba ducked his head around another corner, getting closer and closer to the sound all the time.

He was looking for the kitchen, just as Seto had asked him to. After lunch, Mokuba had waited around for a servant to pass through the hallways with dirty dishes so that he could follow them. He'd hidden himself under a table with a table cloth over most of it, and he'd almost been caught when Gozaburo had walked by with his dogs in tow. Nu Wa had stopped for a moment and sniffed at the tablecloth covering Mokuba. She'd left after being dragged along by Gozaburo, but Mokuba's heart rate had definitely quickened after the encounter.

A few minutes later, a redhead with a tray overloaded with unclean plates had bungled her way down the hallway, muttering and cursing to herself under the weight of it. Mokuba had lingered under the table until she'd passed around a corner before crawling out and racing to that corner to peek around it. He did the same again and again, losing her eventually as she made her way deeper into the unknown territory of the Northward wing.

He'd been on the verge of giving up when he'd realized that he could distantly hear the clink and clatter of pots, pans, and dishware. Those sounds had gotten him to where he was now.

There was suddenly a great clanging that almost sent Mokuba running at its proximity, followed by raised voices.

"What did you go and do that for?"

"You make sure you pick that up, girl. I'm not doing it for you."

"I'm sorry. Don't worry, I'll get it all picked up."

"You better pray that pot's not dented, Ellie, or I'm buying another with the money from your paycheck."

"I said I'm sorry! And, look, it's fine, see?"

"Yes, I see. Now, get back to work."

"Alright, alright, jeez."

Chewing his lip, Mokuba decided what to do next. The people in the kitchen didn't sound very friendly at the moment, which was exactly why Mokuba had hidden in the first place. Anyway, Seto had only wanted him to find the kitchen, not actually scope it out. And, he'd found the general vicinity of it, so he was good.

…But, now what was he supposed to do?

He'd spent the morning making sure he knew the layout of the Westward Wing, tracing the path from his room to Seto's and back several times to make sure that he'd always be able to find it. And, he also knew the various ways of getting from his room to the breakfast and dining rooms, and also to the front foyer. He'd gone and found a few doors leading to the outside from the Westward Wing, as well. So, he basically had that area of the house covered.

He guessed that he might as well as discover what he could about this part of the house, too, but this was where most of the servants seemed to be, and who knew how they would take to him being here.

Mokuba began making his way back the way he had come, imagining as he did so the days of boredom stretching out ahead of him. Mokuba sighed, wishing there was a rock or something he could kick in front of him.

Noah was still a kid, right? Shouldn't they have some sort of games lying around for him?

_Maybe Seto wouldn't mind if I went and played with his Duel Monsters cards._ Admittedly, it wouldn't be as much fun playing it by himself, but at least it would be something.

Mokuba came to the crossing of two hallways, and, out of the corner of his eye, he saw sunlight. He hadn't noticed it before because of his focus on his goal, but now the sudden brightness within the mansion was something of a shock to his system. So much of the mansion was confined from the light, just hallways after hallways of windowless rooms and passageways.

_Why not?_ Mokuba walked towards the light. He came to a glass door that opened onto a gray stone patio. And, beyond that, were rosebushes upon rosebushes upon rosebushes.

Mokuba's jaw dropped. Dazedly he lifted his hand and turned the French door handle, stepping out onto the patio.

All the roses were a dull blood red, the same color as the suit he and Seto had seen Gozaburo in. They were arranged in orderly hedges, exactly the same space of lawn between each row of vegetation.

"Wow," Mokuba breathed out. The lines of red seemed to go on forever.

_I've got to show this to Seto._

* * *

But, the chance never came to show it to Seto, because Seto was always working. From the moment Seto got out of his science class that day, he spent the hour before dinner working to catch up to Noah, as well as the hours after history class at night, and the hours before breakfast in the morning.

The only time Mokuba ever got to really see Seto was at lunch, and then they had Gozaburo and Noah there watching and listening to everything they did.

Mokuba was alone practically constantly after the first full day, and it was already taking a toll on him just a few days in. It became an almost continuous thought to wonder why there had even been a reason to come here if he'd only end up feeling even worse here than he had at the orphanage. _There_ he hadn't been isolated from everyone else.

But, then, he would feel bad for thinking such things when he knew Seto had worked really hard to get them here, and he'd want to go see him, only to remember that he was busy with something else.

It was in this sort of melancholy roundabout that Sister Mary Therese found Mokuba in.

"Mokuba!" she called from the door to his bedroom, catching him off-guard, almost making him tumble off the bed where he had been sitting.

Mokuba's eyes widened when he first saw her. "Sister Mary Therese!" He ran around the bed and flew into her arms.

She laughed at his exuberant, tackling hug. "My goodness, Mokuba, it's like you haven't seen me in ages!" she exclaimed.

"…Mokuba?" He hadn't let go yet. "Are you okay, Mokuba?"

Mokuba made himself let go and pull back. "Yeah, I'm okay," he said somewhat breathlessly. "What are you doing here?" he asked, trying to distract from the state he knew he was in.

"I volunteered to be the one to see how you and your brother were adjusting to your new home. We weren't just going to send you off without thinking of you ever again, you know," she joked with him. Sister Mary Therese was a modern nun, dressed plainly and sensibly in black with a simple black scarf around her hair instead the large robes and all-consuming headpiece of older times.

"Yeah. Seto mentioned that someone was going to come by."

Sister Mary Therese sighed playfully. "How I ever thought I would stay one step ahead of your brother I'll never know. How is he by the way?"

"He's… he's working hard," Mokuba said, thinking it would be a bad idea to lie to a nun. Were half-truths lies?

"Yes, that's what your father said. It looks like even someone like your brother can be challenged sometime by something, eh?" Sister Mary Therese was still smiling, but she was also noticing. "So, where is your brother? Your father said he'd let him have the rest of the day off from his lessons."

"He did?" Mokuba looked like a bomb had blown up in his face. "He didn't tell me."

"Oh. Well, do you know where he would be?" Sister Mary Therese gently coaxed.

"His room, probably," Mokuba answered vaguely.

"Could you show me where that is, Mokuba?"

"Excuse me, Sister, but I could show you the way," Anna put in from the door. Mokuba hadn't even noticed her there, but she must have been the one to show Sister Mary Therese to his room.

"Of course, but I'd still like Mokuba here to come, alright, Mokie?" the nun turned back to the child.

Mokuba had almost forgotten she knew about his baby-name. He nodded and, without waiting for her, began making his way out to the hall and to Seto's room.

With Mokuba walking several steps ahead of them, the Sister took the opportunity to do her job and took to questioning Anna about the boys.

"So, what do you think of Seto?" she suddenly asked the girl.

"Oh, well, he's interesting," Anna scrambled for something else to say. "He makes jokes at the oddest times, and they always make me laugh."

_Seto's making jokes?_ the Sister thought. _Maybe this move really was good for him._

_Jokes? _Mokuba thought. _Seto never makes jokes. Not with other people._

"Really? And, what about Mokuba?" the nun pressed.

"He's a little quiet. But, I know he's been having fun exploring and stuff until his tutor gets here. He's good at amusing himself."

_It's like Mokuba and Seto have switched personalities on me._

"Hm, remarkable. Thank you." She saw that Mokuba had reached a door and was waiting for her. When she got within a couple of steps, Mokuba knocked.

"Come in."

_Mokuba never knocked before. He'd just barge right in if he knew his brother was on the other side._ The list of oddities was building in Sister Mary Therese's mind.

Mokuba and the Sister walked in, finding Seto faced away from them, doing schoolwork at a desk on the opposite side of the room. He had a mirror propped on the desk and he used that to see who I was.

"Hello, Sister," he greeted, not actually turning around.

"And, hello to you, Seto. How are you doing?"

"Fine. Busy."

_Well, the lack of response is still characteristic of the Seto I knew._ Sister Mary Therese never knew why, but Seto always seemed to not care very much for her. He'd put up with her for Mokuba's sake, but that had been it.

"What life like now that you're a member of the rich and famous?" she teased, watching his reaction carefully.

"I'm neither rich nor famous at the moment, Sister. You're thinking of Gozaburo," he dismissed the question.

"You don't call him 'dad' or 'father'?"

"He calls him 'Pops' sometimes," Mokuba interjected.

Sister Mary Therese looked down to see him still standing beside her, a look in his eyes that said he wanted to go over to his brother but didn't feel that he could. When he caught her looking, he looked down, hiding his gaze.

_This isn't good,_ she thought. Normally, the post-adoption inspection was a serious matter, with all the reviewers taught to look for certain signs that showed that things weren't working out for the child or children. This case, however, was different. Gozaburo Kaiba was one of the main benefactors of the orphanage. Without him there might not be an orphanage, so there was no way anyone was actually going to try to take Seto and Mokuba away from him. But, no one had anticipated there being any reason to take them away, either.

Sister Mary Therese had volunteered to take the routine review because she thought it would give her the chance to visit with one of her favorites to have ever passed through the orphanage, Mokuba. She knew she'd have to at least pretend to inspect a little bit, but there were suddenly things popping up that were turning this into a real check up on the adoptees.

"I hear you two have a new brother. What's he like?"

_Who's going to answer?_

"He's fine," Seto said.

_Mokuba's usually the one answering._

"Oh? What's his name? Do you share any interests?"

"Sister." Seto finally turned around to address her with a look of tedium. "I have a lot to catch up on after the orphanage held me back. So, I'd like to get back to that, if you please. I'm quite content here, and I don't have time for your questions."

"…Alright, Seto. I just wanted to make sure you and your brother are okay."

"We're fine, Sister Mary Therese. Goodbye." Seto turned around again.

"Goodbye, Seto."

* * *

A few hours later Sister Mary Therese was getting ready to leave.

"I hope you found everything to your liking, Sister," Gozaburo said, standing just inside the door to see her off.

"I must say, I've never seen Seto looked so consumed by something ever. His brilliant mind must be loving this chance to stretch itself."

"Yes. I'm glad to be able to provide such a stimulating environment for him. It would be wasteful to let such a mind languish." There was a phony grin on Gozaburo's face as he said this. It gave the nun uncomfortable shivers.

"Mokuba seems a bit subdued though," she brought up cautiously.

"He's had a lot of time by his self unfortunately, what with my needing to work and his brothers already having their lessons. I'm sure he'll be fine once his tutor gets here."

"Yes, I'm sure," Sister Mary Therese repeated. "But, still, I formed bond with Mokuba while he was at the orphanage. Even a little bit with his brother, as well. They were so sweet together, I remember. I must confess to worrying about them."

"You don't need to worry about anything, Sister. I know how to take care of my boys."

* * *

Mokuba was walking around the estate. Again. With nothing else to do, he'd developed a circuit over the past couple of weeks: out a Westward Wing door, around the front, all the way to the gate, back up to the Eastward Wing, and around to the rose garden in the back before going back inside to do… nothing. He'd usually make this same pass at least five times a day, often more.

At the moment, he was just getting ready to turn the corner to get to the rose garden when he heard a snuffling, scratching sound. Looking all over for the source of the sound, Mokuba finally noticed a bush set near the house had its branches flailing slightly about in unnatural, untimed sways.

Mokuba made his way over to the bush and got down on all fours. Before he even lowered his head to see under the bows of the bush, a questioning _mew_ greeted him. Placing the side of his face on the ground, Mokuba saw a small white kitten, dabbled in black and gray all over its tiny body.

"Hello, Kitty," Mokuba cooed at the kitten. "What are you doing here?" Just like with Nu Wa, Mokuba held out his hand and let the kitten come to him. Once it was in reach, Mokuba gently reached over it and got a grip on the scruff of its neck. Pulling it out, Mokuba sat cross-legged on the ground and set the kitten on his lap.

"You shouldn't be here kitten," he said, petting it from its ears to its tail. The kitten wasn't protesting in the least, though it didn't seem entirely content either. "There are some dogs here who wouldn't hesitate to go after a little thing like you, especially with no one to protect you."

Mokuba had Seto to protect him. If he didn't, he knew Noah and Gozaburo would have done something to get rid of him by now. Of course, if he didn't have Seto he wouldn't be here in the first place—

_Stop it!_ Mokuba told himself.

"_Mreew,_" the kitten called up from Mokuba's lap, a disgruntled look on its face.

"You're probably hungry."

_I do have some food that I saved for Seto. He doesn't seem to eat as much anymore…_

_No. I'm not allowed to have a pet. The dogs…_

_The dogs never come into our part of the house. Usually, they're cooped up in the courtyard. Besides, I'm so lonely, and this kitten looks like it's completely alone…_

"Okay, kitten," Mokuba started gleefully, having come to a decision. "You're coming back to my room with me."

**Thank you for reading. This, as well as the first chapter, was an introductory chapter for the fic. Things will be picking up in the third and fourth chapters, but the plot won't actually be introduced until chapter five. Chapter three will be posted December 11, 2010. Generally, my posts are going to be two weeks apart, with the occasional one or three weeks break depending on how much I have on my plate at any given time.**

**I'm sorry if parts or even the whole of this chapter seemed rushed. The fact is, it was rushed to get it out by its deadline, so there really is no excuse. I may decide to come back and rewrite many of these chapters once the actual project is over, but, for now, this is going to be the way things are if I don't get my ass in gear and stay on top of things. Once again, it would seem I've come in a thousand words short of my goal, so that will be another thing I'll be working on.**

**On a separate, final note for those of you who have possibly discovered this story through ****TOFOSK****, the pole "What rating would you like to see ****The One Friend of Seto Kaiba** **have?" will close November 30, 2010, so please go to my profile and vote before them. Thank you!**


	3. The Enemy of My Enemy

**Welcome to chapter three. This chapter was delayed due to familial events, so I'm sorry if anyone was looking forward to this being out yesterday and were disappointed when it wasn't. Also, it's even shorter than usual, three thousand wrod short of what I wanted, so I also apologize for that.**

**Also, there was a slight error in the previous chapter in regards to the time limit Seto had to catch up to Noah. I first put a month, and later I put two weeks. I meant it to be two weeks, because Seto's just the type to be able to catch up that quickly, and I don't believe Gozaburo would cut him much slack, since the longer it takes Seto to be on the same page as Noah, the longer till Noah is really challenged.**

**And, it didn't become known to me until today that the first chapter was lacking all its breaks. If no one commented on it, I'm just going to assume it wasn't that big of a problem and that people were able to follow along with the story just fine without them. Unless someone specifically mentions it, it'll be left the way it is for now rather than the whole chapter being republished to cure something that doesn't seem to bother people very much. Hopefully the breaks will remain in this chapter.**

**I do not own ****Yugioh!****.**

**Chapter Three: The Enemy of My Enemy…**

"Boys, meet my board of directors. Gansley, my vice-president of business strategy, Crump, who's responsible for the majority of the accounting, Johnson, our main legal advisor, Nesbitt, our technical devisor and consultant, and, finally, Lector, my personal assistant," Gozaburo introduced, waving his hand in the direction of the five men seated at the board room's table. "Everyone, these would be Seto and Mokuba, my sons."

"Hello, boys," Johnson greeted for them all.

"Hello," Seto slowly said, thoroughly taking in each man individually. Mokuba didn't say anything, barely looking up to meet the gazes of the board members.

"And, how are you today, Noah?" Gansley queried, mindful of who was the _real_ son in this whole arrangement.

"Well enough, Gansley," Noah replied, standing aloof from the rest of his family, refusing to acknowledge the other brats. _How could Father actually call them his sons?_

"How is life finding you, boys? It must be very much a change from where you were," Lector said, trying to adopt a paternal tone.

"Not really," Seto answered nonchalantly, meeting Lector's wide eyes with his own half-lidded, bluntly rebuffing the feeble attempt at small talk.

"Hmm," Johnson murmured ponderingly to himself, watching the newcomer easily set himself up as a dominant force.

"Sir, shall we discuss the arrangements to be made for while you're away at the conference?" Johnson queried, arranging before him a black ledger and several files pertaining to the events to be held at the triennial International Armaments Business Conference.

"Yes, let us. Boys, go wait in the hall," Gozaburo ordered as he walked to his seat at the head. Noah paused midway to the table, surprised at the dismissal. The single empty seat, to the left of Gozaburo, was Noah's place, where he sat during these meetings to learn business strategy by watching his father and the Big 5.

"But —,"

"Noah," Gozaburo's voice quickly snapped out, eyes flashing at the use of _that_ word again. "Go join your brothers. They're having to wait for you." Seto and Mokuba were already beyond the glass doors, looking back into the room: Mokuba confusedly, Seto challengingly, daring Noah to do something that would cause him to lose even more favor with his father.

"Yes, Father," Noah mumbled darkly, not looking away from Seto's taunting gaze. He stiffly made his way to the door, reaching his "brothers" before moving off to the side, out of sight through the glass doors, Seto and Mokuba following him.

"So, gentlemen, let's get to what you really want to discuss. What do you think of my new sons?" Gozaburo asked, leaning back in his seat. _This should be enlightening._ A cruel smile spread across his face as he waited for the fun to begin.

The board members looked from on member to the next, wondering who would breach the subject.

"Well, sir," Gansley finally took over, clearing his throat, "it does seem… rather _out of character_ for you to have brought something, or someone, as is the case, into your life that… lacked such refinement and value…"

"And," Nesbitt took over, "though it was explained to us, we still have a hard-time comprehending why you see such a need to do so."

"Noah needed improvement, and this was the best way to get it in the areas most needing that improvement," Gozaburo brusquely stated. "Shall we move on?"

"Well…" Crump began, again looking at his counterparts for support. "There is one more item we would like to linger on…"

"Yes, we were wondering, sir," Johnson calmly began, "that, because of the legal implications of the Kaiba name within the company, if there was any sort of chance that Seto would at any time be available as the next CEO of Kaiba Corporation."

Gozaburo threw his head back and laughed, his expectations from his board being met. "As if I would _ever_ give my company to some common, low-life orphan! No, Noah is now and will always be my one and only heir."

There was a crash from outside and a muffled yell.

After a brief, silence-filled moment, Gozaburo rose stiffly from his seat.

"Excuse me for a moment, gentlemen." He quickly stalked to the door, opening it, allowing the sounds of the commotion to further intrude into the room, before briskly shutting it behind him. Another brief scuffle ensued by the sounds of it, then, the sound of Gozaburo's footfalls on their way to his office made their way to the board member's ears.

"Looks like this adoption isn't going as well for Mr. Kaiba as he'd been hoping," Johnson commented, a wry edge of humor to his voice as he pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose.

"Indeed," Nesbitt concurred, just barely keeping his malicious chuckles to himself

"Actually," Crump intruded, "Noah's improvement in each of his classes has improved by 4.87 percent since Seto's arrival."

"That much in just a month," Nesbitt murmured in mild amazement.

"What of the new boy's?" Lector drawlingly questioned.

"_He_ has actually gone _down_ by 12.1 percent," Crump informed them. "But, then again, he was already at 107.97 percent before he arrived. And, even Noah can't maintain a perfect 100 percent within the classes he has. At the moment, Seto is actually above Noah, despite his sudden slump."

"Perhaps the new boy's conserving himself, since he knows he's gone once Noah's better than him. And, rather than push himself to do his best, he's saving it for when he needs it," Johnson speculated. He gave a short laugh. "Either that or we're completely overestimating the child." He laughed again, and Crump and Nesbitt joined in.

Gansley, gave a small, quickly fading smile as he stared at the opposite wall, contemplating things.

Lector's eyes narrowed. As Gozaburo's personal assistant, he felt he had certain insights into his character that others didn't. And, what he knew indicated that Gozaburo would never waste himself on investments that wouldn't pay themselves off in immense quantities.

The boy was valuable.

* * *

"I'm sick of this happening!" Gozaburo shouted from within his office. Mokuba, left outside in the hallway, winced for his brother and Noah, the recipients of this violent lecture.

They'd been getting into fights, _real_ fights, ever since Seto had accepted the challenge of catching up with Noah in two weeks and succeeded.

Recently, Mokuba had gotten to see his own show of Fu Xi and Nu Wa doing their terrible mock-fighting, and, every time Seto and Noah started in again, Mokuba was now reminded of that.

_They don't _really_ mean it, do they?_

"Your conduct has been sickening, both of you! Noah, you should most definitely know better. And, Seto, _you_ should be worried about whether this sort of behavior might land you back in the orphanage," Gozaburo continued to rage from inside.

Mokuba bit down on his lower lip and squeezed his eyes shut.

Seto had finally told him what had made him so angry at Gozaburo and Noah, and it had Mokuba terrified and stressed horribly. Any wrong move Seto made could get them thrown out. Not that Mokuba liked the Kaibas, it was just that he hadn't liked the orphanage, and the threat that he and Seto would be separated…

Mokuba needed to stop thinking about why the Kaibas were better than the orphanage; it only led him to the belief that maybe… were the Kaibas worse…?

Seto didn't think so.

At least, now Mokuba knew why Seto had been so focused all along. Were Seto to have even let up once during those first couple of weeks, he and Mokuba would have been gone…

Mokuba began running his hands roughly through his hair and massaging his scalp. God, he was so conflicted about all of this. He never thought he'd _want_ to go to the orphanage.

"Mokuba!" Mokuba practically jumped out of his skin. "Get in here!"

He must have finished ranting at the elder sons, and now it was Mokuba's turn. But, what had Mokuba done?

Mokuba carefully pushed away from the wall and walked over to the glass doors to the office.

"Well, hurry up, boy! And, what on earth happened to your hair?" Gozaburo shouted.

Mokuba jumped again before hurrying over to the desk to stand in the large space between his two brothers, trying to tamp down his messy hair as he did so.

"Maybe it would be better to just cut it all off," Gozaburo muttered into his moustache.

Mokuba looked sideways at his brother, his _real_ brother, to find Seto clenching his jaw and glaring daggers at the old man. Mokuba didn't know if he'd ever seen his brother so angry over something.

Seto had never been yelled at like that before. Mokuba knew that for sure. No teacher, no nun, no… mother or father had ever treated Seto like some insubordinate child, and it was obviously ticking him _off_.

"Now that we've gotten that bump smoothed over," Gozaburo started up again, "next week is a conference between all the world's major weapon suppliers. You three will be coming with me."

"Really, Father?" Noah asked, looking delighted. Mokuba thought he must have never had been allowed to go before.

"Yes. You and Seto will be let off your studies during that time. In return, I expect each of you to pay extra attention to what's going on during the conference. And, I don't just mean the meetings you'll be accompanying me in. Everything will be something that I may test you over. You will not be let off the hook if you should construe something in the incorrect manner, you will be punished for it. Whoever comes out on top at the end of it all, wins."

"What do we win?" Seto asked viciously, causing both Mokuba and Noah to look over at him.

Gozaburo just chuckled.

"Other than victory itself, does there really need to be a prize?"

Seto and Noah's eyes met in an all-consuming glare. And, in unison, they answered, "No, sir."

* * *

"Welcome to the International Armaments Business Conference, Mr. Kaiba. I'm glad you could make it this time," a man that reminded Seto of the orphanage's spineless director greeted as the family was admitted to the ballroom of the grandiose hotel the conference was taking place in.

Gozaburo didn't even bother answering the man. He waltzed in, three boys in tow, drawing the attention of the entire crowd already gathered there, begetting a burst of whispered conversations.

"…so, he did come this year…"

"…wonder what kept him from the last conference…"

"…the first time his son's ever come…"

"…did you hear he adopted?"

"…Noah's not shaping up very well, it would seem…"

"…name's Seto…"

"…another genius in the family..."

"…Is he really that smart…?"

"…oh, yes. Why else would Gozaburo adopt him…?"

"…haven't heard about the younger lad…"

"…package deal…"

"…I guess merely bearing the Kaiba name couldn't save Noah…"

Mokuba shrank back behind his brother from all the judging eyes directed at their little group, and was surprised when he actually felt Seto put his arm around his shoulders in comfort.

"Mokuba," Seto murmured, "I want you to not fret about any of this, okay? They're only staring because they're envious. Just follow my lead for a little while, okay? Then, you can try your hand at doing what you feel is right."

"Seto, why are you—?"

"Not now, Mokuba."

And, they were off, winding their way through the crowd.

They moved from group to group, lingering only long enough to say hello, check on how their business was, make some comment to psych out the competition, and move on. Both Seto and Noah soaked in everything that Gozaburo did, how the recipients reacted, and made predictions as to how this would affect the future.

None of the groups seemed to have any children among them, until they got to one specific group made up of only two people.

"Gozaburo Kaiba!" a voice called above the rest, bearing a distinct German accent.

The boys heard Gozaburo make a truly disgusted sound under his breath before he called back, "Hans! How are you?"

"Quite vell, quite vell. And, you? I heard you adopted two vittle boys, and it would seem zat would be true," Hans said as he came up to the foursome.

"Boys, this would be Hans von Schroeder. He runs a semi-successful weapon company in Germany," Gozaburo informed them, obviously not thinking much of the man before him.

"You're such a joker, Herr Kaiba," Hans said, knowing he was being insulted, but not wanting to give Gozaburo the win. "This is my first-born," Hans stated, indicating a pink-haired child by his side, "Ziegfried von Schroeder."

"Hello, Herr Kaiba," young Ziegfried greeted.

"Mm, hello, child. These would be my own sons, Noah, Seto, and the small one is Mokuba." Gozaburo didn't bother to differentiate between Seto and Noah, neither of whom had as of yet entered the public eye, annoying the crap out of Noah, who forgot to analyze the 'why's' of it, and giving Seto something to think about and learn from.

"Hello," Ziegfried said to the three.

"Hello," Noah responded, his nose in the air.

"Hi," Mokuba mumbled, forgetting to follow Seto's lead, who stayed silent.

"Did you hear about the deal we have going with the—"

"—Delaney group? Yes, but we're taking it over that deal. I'm afraid you'll have to find someone else to be in league with, Hans," Gozaburo told him dispassionately, looking around for the next group to have fawn over him.

"Isn't it all just so interesting," Ziegfried quietly commented to the other boys.

"Who asked you?" Noah sneered.

Ziegfried turned his attention to him. "Would you be Noah or Seto?"

Noah's nostrils and eyes flared with outrage. "I am _Noah Kaiba_."

"Oh, zen never mind. I have no interest in you."

Noah's jaw dropped as Ziegfried turned to the other brother.

"Seto, I've heard a lot about you. You are zaid to be a prodigy."

_And, I'm NOT!_ Noah thought.

"What's your point?" Seto asked, not as arrogantly as Noah, but not respectful either.

"Just that you and I might have something in common if that is the case." Ziegfried shrugged as he spoke, looking slyly off to the side.

"I _severely_ doubt that," Seto finally responded.

Ziegfried's eyes shot to Seto, almost as if he couldn't believe some orphan-boy was dismissing him.

"Vha—?"

"Boys, let's move on," Gozaburo commanded, already walking away.

"Goodbye, Ziegfried," Seto bid before gently grasping his little brother's shoulder and steering him away from the shocked pinkette.

Once they were a fair distance away, Gozaburo turned back to look down at the line of boys following him around to deliver a brief lecture.

"Those were the von Schroeders, boys. They specialize in everything we specialized in, but the crucial difference is that _we_ are successful, _we _are_ better_. Those Germans will never be able to catch up to us, no matter what area we or they choose to pursue. That being said, avoid them. Because they will always be below us, they will always be trying to crawl their way up to our level, and they will not overlook the fact that there are four of you to be used if you are open to it. Got it?"

"Yes, sir," all three responded.

"Good. Feel free to wander around for now. I will come to collect you when it's time for us to depart. Till then, don't forget the competition, Noah, Seto." And, with that, he left the three of them alone in a mass of unknown people.

Mokuba and Noah shared a bewildered look before Noah realized the person he was sharing it with and turned briskly away, disappearing into the throng, away from the brothers.

"Follow me, Mokuba," Seto said, and began winding his own way through the people surrounding them.

"Where are we going, Seto?"

"The buffet."

"Why?"

"You're really not hungry?" Seto asked looking back over his shoulder while still zigzagging his way through the people.

"Well, a little," Mokuba admitted.

"That's why."

They made it to the buffet table.

"Mokuba, I need you to stay here for a while. I'll be back in just a little bit, but there are a couple of people I saw that I really want to speak with."

"Oh… alright."

"I'll be back really soon, Mokuba," Seto promised. "Just stay here until then."

"Okay." Mokuba wouldn't meet Seto's eyes. Seto stood there for a moment, worried for his little brother, not having really given him attention for a while.

But, there was time for that later. Soon, Seto was off through the crowds himself, leaving Mokuba behind again.

Mokuba looked at the food, suddenly not hungry any longer.

"Hello," a voice said behind him.

Mokuba turned around to see a boy his age, with dark magenta hair and freckles sprinkling over his nose and cheekbones.

"…Hello," Mokuba responded slowly, not exacting prone to trusting a person who came from this group of people.

"I'm pretty sure we're the only people here whose ages aren't in their double digits yet," he boy joked, scratching the back of his head and blushing a little bit.

Mokuba felt his lips twitch up and a giggle make its way out of his throat.

"I don't think people our age are supposed to be here," Mokuba replied.

"Yeah, well, the only reason my father brought me was because he heard your father was bringing you," the boy said.

"Oh… my name's Mokuba… uh, Mokuba Kaiba, I guess." Mokuba held out his hand like he had seen Seto and Noah and Gozaburo doing with everyone.

"Leon," the other boy answered, accepting Mokuba's handshake. "Leon von Schroeder."

* * *

"Mr. Pegasus," Seto said, catching the man's attention.

"Yes?" Pegasus turned around, searching for the voice who'd spoken his name, finally seeing the speaker, several feet lower than he had expected. "Ah, hello, little boy."

"Yes, hello. What are you doing here?" Seto blankly asked.

"Whatever do you mean, little boy?" Pegasus asked patronizingly.

"My name is Seto Kaiba," Seto informed him, getting sick of being called 'little boy'.

"Oh, yes, Gozaburo's new toy." Pegasus waved his hand dismissively, as if suddenly Seto didn't matter in the least.

Seto gave the man a look that had fellow conference-goers diverting their gaze. "So, why are you here? You make _games._"

"A friend invited me along, otherwise I wouldn't have dared come among the leading killers on the Lord's earth." Seto's eyes widened considerably at that statement. _Internatial_ Armaments_ Business Conference… _"Why do you care, little Kaiba-boy?" The child was starting to get Pegasus's annoyed attention.

"I'm merely curious." Seto suddenly put on a giant grin before walking away, vanishing in a matter of steps.

"…What a strange young man," Pegasus muttered to himself. "Interesting, though."

* * *

Noah escaped into the hallway outside the ballroom, getting away from the rush of people inside.

_Oh, then never mind. I have no interest in you._

How _dare_ that pink-haired, German brat say that to him! Especially since Noah was from a family so far ahead of Ziegfried's own.

_Seto's only twelve, and __he__ is already so far beyond you that it sickens me._

Noah's muscles bunched and his shoulders began to quiver as he remembered his father's words.

"I am not a hypocrite," he snarled to himself.

"Vhy vould you be a hypocrite?"

Noah whirled to find Ziegfried standing just behind him.

"What are you doing out here?" Noah snarled.

"Zeh same as you: getting a breath of fresh air," Ziegfried calmly replied. "I also vished to apologize vor my comment zat I made earlier. I mean no offense, only vished to convey zat Seto is zeh talk of the convention and that I vanted to meet vith him."

"He is?" A void of dread was opening in Noah's stomach.

"Oh, yes. It is quite annoying is it not? He is not zeh only child genius here. Ve two are just as smart, if not more so."

Noah snorted. "Well, _I_ might be. I don't know about _you_, despite what you told _Seto._"

"Yes, vell, anyvay, I do suppose it is too much to hope zat all zeh rumors about zhis Seto are not true? I hate being second best."

Just as Ziegfried had intended, Noah only took in the top layer of the statement in regards to Seto, rather than the entire meaning. And, an idea began forming in Noah's mind, one that Ziegfried had wanted to create all along, it being the purpose of him following Noah out into the hall.

"Ziegfried, you and I seem to share a lot more in common than you and Seto seem to."

"Oh, really?" Ziegfried questioned, using all his might to keep a devious smile off his lips.

"Yes. And, because of the common thread, I think you would be ideal for a plan I have to make everyone see Seto as being not such a genius."

* * *

But, the day before Noah's and Ziegfried's plan was to be carried out, Leon von Schroeder, unappreciated son of the von Schroeder family, made a move that changed the course of everything.

It had been several days since the meeting in the hotel's ballroom, and days had been taken up with meetings of various kinds to discuss the past, present, and future of weapons dealing. During that time, Mokuba and Leon had become fast friends, learning to meet in deserted places of the hotel and explore this new camaraderie there.

The day before the plan's execution, Leon came running up to Mokuba, words attempting to spill past his lips, but inhibited by his breathless state. Finally, after some calming words from Mokuba and time to catch his breath, Leon spilled.

"My brother and yours are planning something bad," he got out, still needing some recuperation from his fleeing run to find Mokuba and get away from his brother.

"What? Seto?" What could Seto be involved with that was bad and included a von Schroeder? After all these days, Mokuba had forgotten that Leon himself was a member of the Kaibas's rival family.

"No, not Seto. Noah. He and Ziegfried want to do something bad _to_ Seto." Mokuba gaped at the words coming from Leon's mouth.

"Noah's plan is to get Ziegfried to steal our father's cufflinks and pocket watch, and then they're going to somehow blame the robbery on Seto."

"Oh, no," Mokuba muttered sadly. He thought that, since Noah and Seto hadn't gotten on many fights during what had come to seem a vacation to Mokuba, that maybe they were so nasty about the other one any longer. Obviously, he'd been wrong.

"But, Ziegfried's not going to be following that plan," Leon's voice broke through Mokuba's thoughts. "Ziegfried is going to steal father's cufflinks and pocket watch, but then, he's going to wait for Noah to go down to the lobby where Ziegfried's supposed to hand the things over, and then he's going to put them in _Noah's_ room! He says that getting _that_ son in trouble would be more advantageous to the von Schroeders than doing the same to the other… Mokuba what are we going to do?"

"…We have to tell Seto."

* * *

Seto was lying on his bed, no meetings for him to sit in taking place at the moment, when Mokuba, Leon in tow, came to tell him what he'd overheard.

"Seto!" Mokuba shouted as he burst in through the door, breaking the habit of knocking he'd been working on for the past month. Leon followed more quietly, a little off-put by his new friend not being discouraged from interacting with his brother.

In truth, Mokuba was discouraged; he and Seto hadn't spoken in for what seemed to be forever. Seto didn't have much time to himself, and the time he did have, he often spent just like this, lying in bed, staring at the ceiling.

"Mokuba?" Seto murmured confusedly, having been on the brink of slumber before the young boys had come charging in.

"Seto, we've got something important to tell you," Mokuba said, hurrying to the bedside.

"Who's 'we'?" Seto asked, rubbing the heel of one hand against his cheek, still trying to get back to the land of the awake.

…

"Mokuba?" Seto questioned again.

Mokuba had become distracted. Seto was using the exact tones and mannerism that he'd used before they'd become Kaibas. It was like they were at the orphanage again. Or, even… at home.

"Er, um, I'm Leon," the kid spoke up when Mokuba just continued looking sadly at his brother.

"…von Schroeder?" Seto blinked a few times, the name ringing a bell. The kid nodded.

…_shit._

"So, what did you guys come to tell me?" As Seto became more awake, he remembered more and more that he was now a Kaiba, and Mokuba came more and more back into the reality where they no longer had a true home with a true family.

"Uh, oh! Leon's brother, Ziegfried, he and Noah are planning on getting you I really big trouble Seto!" Mokuba suddenly remembered the reason he'd come running in here in the first place.

"They're going to steal my father's cufflinks and pocket watch and put them in your room to incriminate you," Leon added, finally speaking up forcefully.

"Really…"

"Leon! Zere you are." Ziegfried stood framed in the door to Seto's room. "I've had to search everywhere."

"I was just talking to Moku—"

"I don't care. Stay away from zhese people, Leon," Ziegfried admonished, stepping only so far into the room to snag Leon's sweater and drag him out. "Good day!" he practically spat at Seto and Mokuba as he left them, towing his little brother behind him.

_Hmph. He's pretty anti-Kaiba for someone who's plotting with Gozaburo's son,_ Mokuba thought to himself, irritated by Ziegfried suddenly acting as if he didn't want anything to do with them.

"…Mokuba, are you very attached to this Leon kid?" Seto hesitated to ask once the footsteps of the von Schroeder boys retreated.

"Sort of, yeah. He's the first friend I've made since we became Kaibas," said, turning back to look at his now wide awake brother.

Seto sighed, looking away. "Okay."

"Why? What wrong with me being friends with Leon? He's a nice guy."

"Mokuba, didn't you hear what Pops said about avoiding the von Schroeders?"

"Yeah, but you break the rules he sets for us all the time!" Mokuba suddenly shouted, catching Seto off guard. "Why am I the one who always get told 'remember this' and 'don't do that' and 'did you hear what I just said'? It's not fair! I'm lonely, and I have no one to talk to except the kitten, and everything I like I have to give up, and—"

"What kitten, Mokuba?" Seto suddenly interrupted.

Mokuba looked guilty for a moment before a frown took over his face. "His name's Boots and I found him near the rose garden. And, I don't care if it is against the rules, I'm keeping him!" Sobs entered Mokuba's voice, despite how hard he'd been trying to suppress them.

The gaze that had been distant began softening as Mokuba's strangled sobs leaked out. Kneeling down, Seto wrapped his little brother in an enfolding hug which, try as he might, Mokuba wasn't able to resist reciprocating.

"I'm sorry you've been so alone, Mokie. And, I'm glad that you did make a friend while you were here. I'm just worried about what will happen to you if Gozaburo finds out or Leon is more von Schroeder than he is your friend."

"Leon wouldn't do something like that," Mokuba muttered wetly into Seto's collar, sniffling.

"…Okay, Mokie. I trust you," Seto finally said as he rocked his baby brother back and forth.

"Thanks, Seto," Mokuba said as he pulled back, rubbing the leftover tears from his eyes.

"You're welcome, Mokie." Seto stood up. "But, we're still going to have to talk about that kitten," he warned him.

Mokuba pouted, but didn't object.

"Now," Seto began as he started to walk away. "I have to go stop those teal and pink-haired freaks from getting us thrown back in the orphanage."

"What can I do to help?" Mokuba asked, following on Seto's heels.

"You want to help?" Seto asked, surprised.

"Yeah. But, I also want to know why you want to get Noah caught so badly," Mokuba admitted, not feeling as if merely putting a stop to Noah's plan was all that was Seto's motivation.

"…I want to replace Noah, Mokuba."

Mokuba blinked in surprise at Seto's candid, blunt answer.

"_Why?_"

"To remove at least one company from this conference. Everyone here lives the lifestyle they have because other people are suffering and _dying_. Gozaburo was able to afford to adopt us because he makes money off of _killing_ people. I hadn't really taken in that fact before we came here, and now I realize that I don't want a life furnished with the blood of others. I don't want anyone living that life. Admittedly, just taking away the company to see the look at the old man's and Noah's faces would be satisfactory enough, but this is a _real_ reason to do as much as I can to stop them."

"…So, what can I do?" Mokuba asked again.

"You're not going to like my plan, Mokie," Seto said straightforward, seriously, warning Mokuba that just because his ends were noble, that didn't denote his means were.

"Maybe not, but I'll stick back you up, no matter what you do!" Mokuba promised determinedly, hazy violet eyes blazing with loyalty and a brave smile on his lips.

After a moment, Seto smiled down at him too. "Thanks, Mokie." He ruffled his little brother's hair. "Here's the plan…"

* * *

Noah walked around the corner, a miniature evil smirk on his face.

_Any minute now,_ he thought looking down at his wristwatch.

Ziegfried would be meeting him downstairs in the lobby within the next five minutes to hand over his father's things that Noah would then plant in Seto's room. He couldn't _wait_ for the discovery. Noah giggled gleefully to himself.

_Bye-bye, Seto._

A door opened ahead of Noah and his father stepped out of his room.

"Good morning, Father!" Noah cheerfully greeted, practically skipping up to the man.

"I don't know what's so good about it," Gozaburo retorted. "Come along, we're going to the seventh floor."

"Why, Father?" Gozaburo and the rest of the Kaiba family were on the eleventh floor. The von Schroeders were four levels down, on the seventh floor.

"My cufflinks and pocket watch were stolen this morning, Noah,"

"What?" _Father's cufflinks pocket watch? But, it was supposed to have been Schroeder's father's…_

"Some fool thought he could get away with stealing something in this place. Did they not _see_ the security cameras in the halls?" Gozaburo sneered incredulously while Noah blushed to his roots beside him.

"It would seem that pink-haired little twerp of Hans Schroeder's has been lingering around here, too. Not the elder one, but the younger, Leon. No doubt he's been casing the place for his brother, who said he came to _retrieve_ the boy last night."

_I've been double-crossed._

"The boy was denying it, but, once it was mentioned that he was caught on tape, he still denied that he took my items, and instead came up with some hair-brained scheme tht he and an accomplice came up with to get another person in trouble."

_Ziegfried will pay for this!_

They walked to the elevators and were quiet on the way down to the floor where the von Schroeders were housed.

When they stepped off, a medium crowd was gathered in a circle around where Ziegfried was being questioned by his father and a security guard.

"It…It… It was his plan, too!" Ziegfried shouted, pointing straight at Noah in the crowd once he saw the other boy step off the elevator.

"What?" Noah's face was the epitome of shock and innocence. "Why on earth would I want to steal my father's cufflinks and pocket watch?"

_Indeed_, Seto thought as he watched the drama unfolding before him, having arrived earlier and concealing himself among the other bystanders, a self-indulging smile on his lips. He almost felt bad for stealing his adoptive father's things and putting them in place of Hans von Schroeder's… or, maybe not.

Seto allowed himself a quiet laugh before getting back to the show.

"But… It vas your idea all along! And, yours alone!" Ziegfried persisted. "You vanted to pin it on your brother, so dat you could be zeh favorite!"

Gozaburo's eyes narrowed. He turned his beady eyes to his son, taking in how everything about Noah seemed calm, reserved, and blameless… nothing like Noah would usually be upon being accused of competing with Seto for such a trifling thing.

"Well, Noah? How do you respond to these accusations?" Gozaburo questioned, watching his blooded son carefully.

Looking up at him, Noah merely stated, "I deny them," thinking it would be enough to appease his father, who must not actually _believe_ that he would be in league with the _von Schroeders_. They were the enemy, after all. The very thought made Noah want to laugh.

The very thought made Gozaburo want to wipe the smile off his son's face.

The very thought made Seto want to point at the KC logo upon Gozaburo's briefcase and say, "Mine."

"There you have it. My son denies any involvement in stealing his _father's_ own cufflinks and pocket watch," Gozaburo announced slowly to the rest of the crowd. Noah would get what was coming to him, but not before _these_ people.

"I am sorry, Herr Kaiba, for my son's behavior," Hans apologized, embarrassed and fuming by his son's accusation.

"But, Father!" Ziegfried tried to defend himself.

"No, Ziegfried! Zis is zeh end of your speaking!" Hans shouted at his son. "Zere is no excuse for zis act of zhievery!"

"If you don't mind," Gozaburo interrupted. "I would like my things back."

"Ah, of course, Herr Kaiba."

Gathering the accessories in his palms, Hans made a few steps towards Gozaburo before Seto came to stand in his way.

Holding out one hand, Seto silently demanded that the articles be passed to him, which they were after Hans received a nod from Gozaburo. It's not like Seto would be able to run off with the valuables once he had them in-hand.

Gozaburo looked down at his brown-haired son, locking gazes with the boy as he walked up to him. The connection between them insinuated itself again, cutting them off from reality. Seto didn't even try to hide his amusement, though he did remove the smile from his face. Nevertheless, a twinkling blaze of sinfully delighted laughter shown in his eyes, telling Gozaburo everything he needed to know. Noah had conspired with von Schroeder's son to do away with Seto. He'd turned to the _enemy_ of Kaiba Corporation to fulfill his own selfish gains. He may have been smart enough to somehow avoid the cameras, but so had Seto been. For, who else could be responsible for exposing Ziegfried?

And, Noah hadn't just turned against one brother in his actions, but two. Kaiba Corporation was just as much Gozaburo's child as Noah was, perhaps more so since Gozaburo had crafted Kaiba Corp. by hand, all the way from its first conception to now, and he would continue as long as he was capable. And, even then, he would make sure that Kaiba Corp. was passed to Noah after the boy had a full education in the treatment of it.

…unless, Noah should prove to be a liability to the company, to his corporate brother, Gozaburo might have to make a change. Then, Gozaburo would have to…

Almost as if sensing the train of Gozaburo's thoughts, Seto let a small, near-triumphant smile curl his mouth as he handed over Gozaburo's things.

_Yes._

Gozaburo quickly turned his eyes and his thoughts away. But, it was that one almost-thought that Seto had been working so hard to cultivate, and now that it had taken root, even if on the most precarious of ledges, Seto knew it would grow.

**Thanks for reading!**

**The descriptions of the Big Five's jobs at the beginning are accurate, by the way, according to "Yugioh! Wikia."**

**Chapter 4 will be posted December 19, 2010, and I'll also try to get something else out during Winter break, but it won't be ****TOFOSK**** or the second chapter of ****Second Chance****. Sorry, but there is another poll up on my profile that's to help me decide which of those stories to publish a chapter for next. The poll was opened December 2, 2010 and it will close January 17, 2011, the same day I publish the fifth chapter of ****The Kaiba Heir****. **

**Again, thanks for reading, and I hope to see you again soon.**


	4. Like Cats and Dogs

Once, again, I'm sorry for the delay in getting this chapter out. When I was originally outlining the deadlines of this fic, I accidentally thought that Winter Break would be beginning a week earlier than it did, which is why I set the first publishing date for this chapter merely a week after the one preceding it. Realizing this, until chapter eight, all of my dates are going to be pushed back to the date of the chapter following them. Thank you for being understanding!

**This is the first chance that we get to see the fic's T-rating, so be prepared for some violence in this chapter.**

**Also, I would like to say that Fu Xi and Nu Wa (the dogs) are not examples of the archetypal Chow Chow. Keep in mind the treatment they must have gotten from Gozaburo to make them so complacent to him while reading about them in this chapter.**

**I don't own ****Yugioh!**

**Please enjoy!**

**Chapter Four: Like Cats and Dogs**

"I named him 'Boots'," Mokuba murmured, not looking at his brother's expression. He'd been dreading having to show his kitten to Seto once they got back from the IABC, knowing that Seto might ask him, or even demand that he get rid of it.

"Boots," Seto repeated, watching how the kitten cuddled up to Mokuba, absolutely adoring the little boy, even trying to knead him with his pure white paws that had earned him his name.

"Mm hm." Mokuba cast a quick glance up to Seto's face, which was completely blank.

"What did you do with him while we were at the conference?" Seto finally asked.

"Well, I'd been saving food for you before we left, and I left some of that out, but he's pretty good at catching his own food too. And, I just left the door to the outside open so that he could come in at night and go out to do his business. I thought he might run away, but he's still here." A bright smile lit Mokuba's face at that thought before fading again.

"How long have you had him, Mokuba?" Boots wasn't exactly a kitten anymore, though he was still a very young cat.

"Uh." Mokuba scrunched his eyes shut, trying to calculate the number of weeks that had gone by as he ran his fingers through Boots's fur. "I've had him since the day after Sister Mary Therese visited."

"So, over a month, then?"

"Yeah."

Seto looked around the room as he thought. The walls were still bare, as was the little desk that had been placed in the corner, and everything else that could have been augmented with something that told of who occupied the room. The one thing that said Mokuba lived there was Mokuba himself… and the cat.

_He could get in so much trouble if he's caught. Gozaburo would definitely get rid of the cat and that would completely break Mokuba's heart. It probably wouldn't be as bad if _I_ made him get rid of it._

_But, the kitten's basically the only thing he has when I'm not around… and, I'm never around. I didn't even know he _had_ a cat._

Seto ran his hands over his face several times before coming to a decision. Coming to sit beside Mokuba on the bed, he started, "I guess if you haven't been caught by anyone yet, there's probably not that big of a chance that someone's going to discover him."

Mokuba's face began to lighten as he took in his brother's words. He'd been so certain that Seto would tell him that it would be smartest if they got rid of Boots, which he knew it probably was. But, now, Seto said he could keep it, and was even petting the cat himself.

"Thank you, Seto." Mokuba twined one of his arms around his brother, the other keeping a hold on Boots, and cuddled up to him much like a kitten himself.

Seto wrapped his arm around his little brother, too, using the fingers of his hand to tickle Boots beneath his chin.

"You're welcome, Mokie. Just, please, don't make me regret this."

"I won't, Seto. I promise, no one will ever find out about Boots."

"Okay, good."

_Please, let me be doing the right thing._

* * *

Seto finished playing his warm-up scales, not even thinking about where to place his fingers, having memorized the pattern. When he finished, he removed his hands from the keyboard and placed them on his lap, staring off into space, forgetting Bono standing right behind him.

Bono looked speculatively at his new pupil, green eyes taking in the glazed-over blue ones.

"Penny for your thoughts, Seto?" he finally asked. Seto blinked a few times, but didn't make it back to reality from wherever he was, though he did give a heavy, frustrated sigh.

Bono moved to sit on the bench beside him, putting a hand on Seto's shoulder as he did so. Seto jumped a little and finally looked at his teacher.

"My bad," he said, looking down at the keys, bringing a hand up to play a little made-up tune.

"Don't worry about it. We don't really need to practice today. You're doing quite well, even if I did give you those first two weeks off." Seto smirked a little at his remembered "cheating."

Having only two weeks to catch up to Noah had been murder, but he'd made it work, skipping lunch once Gozaburo went back to work full-time, staying up late, waking up early. But, the secret to his success had been using this time, when he was supposed to be learning "Chopsticks" and such, to do his work, Noah playing his violin, none the wiser to Seto catching up to him problem by problem in the next room.

Seto had to admit after that, that Bono was basically one of the most awesome adults he'd ever met. Of course, he'd warned Seto that they'd have to work twice as hard once he was caught up, but so far Seto was able to keep up pretty well with Bono's teachings. He did a much better job of teaching Seto to play than his mother ever did…

"So, what's on your mind, Seto?" Bono queried, taking over the piano keys. Bono also did a better job of getting information out of Seto than anyone else since before the loss of Seto's and Mokuba's parents.

"Several things," Seto hedged, watching the man's fingers move across the ivory and ebony keys. Bono didn't say anything, just waited, biding his time.

"…I did something at the conference," Seto finally confessed. "And, I feel proud of myself for getting away with it. '_Smug_', perhaps, is the better word for it. But, it makes me wonder how much like _them_ I'm becoming." Seto nodded to the room from which violin notes could be heard issuing from. "Especially since I involved Mokuba and this friend he'd made in the whole thing."

'Maybe if you told me what you did I'd be able to understand better," Bono suggested lightly, still playing.

"…Noah and another kid, Ziegfried, the older brother of Mokuba's friend, were going to steal Ziegfried's father's cufflinks and pocket watch, and then put them in my room so that I'd be incriminated. Instead, I had Mokuba steal Gozaburo's things and Mokuba's friend, Leon, steal his father's. We switched them, so that when Ziegfried thought he was grabbing his father's, he was really grabbing Gozaburo's."

"Ah," Bono said easily.

"When Ziegfried came to get his brother, he was caught on tape. I got into the security room and edited the tapes a little, so that it showed Ziegfried going into Gozaburo's room rather than mine, and completely erased Mokuba going in there."

_He did say he was the techie type when he gets a chance._

Then, it was just a matter of changing the time stamps and making sure that they caught Ziegfried before he went down to meet with Noah. It was hardly any work at all."

"What did you do with Ziegfried's and Leon's father's things?"

Seto laughed grimly to himself. "I put them in Noah's things, just like Ziegfried had been planning to do all along. It also helped to give some credence to Ziegfried's story to have von Schroeder's things missing, too. Noah was able to get them back, Lord knows how, but they were gone long enough to make Gozaburo doubt, which was all I needed."

"You're pretty trusting when I'm someone who works for Gozaburo," Bono commented, amazed somewhere deep inside his cool, suave façade that Seto would confide so much in him.

Seto smirked at him. I haven't told you anything that I wouldn't mind the old man knowing."

Bono smiled lazily down at the self-satisfied boy. Just talking seemed to help him to shed some of his burdens, but…

"You're still worried about something."

"About something else, yeah."

"Can you tell me about this one?"

Seto looked pensively across the room. "I could… but, if you are working for Gozaburo in more ways than one, I don't want to get Mokuba in trouble."

"Just that sentence would be enough to get him in trouble, don't you think?"

"True… he has a _cat._"

Bono blinked. He hadn't been expecting that. "…And?"

"And, I said he could keep it."

"What's so bad about that?"

"He's been specifically told not to bring one in, he'd be heartbroken of it were taken away, the _dogs_…"

"Things do seem stacked against it."

"Should I have told him to get rid of it?"

Bono thought a little while.

"No. This way, if something does happen, he'll still have you, but he wouldn't have anyone the other way," was his concise answer.

"Right… thanks, Bono."

* * *

"So, Mokuba," Bono began. "Did your mother try to teach you piano, too?"

Mokuba's eyes widened. "How did you know that?"

Bono smiled. He could already tell that he was going to enjoy teaching this boy. "Seto did when I asked him what he wanted to play his first day. Do you want to keep playing piano, or would you like to try something else?"

Mokuba thought for a moment. "Is Seto playing the piano, too?"

"Yes."

'Then, that's what I want to play," the boy answered brightly. Bono chuckled to himself.

"Alright. I suppose I'll have to teach you how to play the scales properly, too," he said as he led the way over to the piano.

Mokuba scrunched his eyebrows, but didn't comment as he scrambled into the bench.

"How's your cat?" Bono asked off-handedly, sitting beside him.

Mokuba whipped his head around, eyes wide and a little frightened.

"Something else your brother told me." Mokuba sagged in relief.

"Um, he's fine. His name's Boots."

"A good name for a cat," Bono commented, making Mokuba smile.

"That's what I thought. But, he's still really more of a kitten."

"Oh? …What does he look like?" This was starting to sound familiar to Bono.

"He's mostly white, but he has a lot of gray and black, too," Mokuba answered.

"Would he happen to have green eyes like mine?" Bono asked praying that the answer was no.

"Yes! He has eyes _exactly_ like yours. How did you guess?"

"It just figured that it would," Bono murmured.

"Oh. I thought you might have seen him while we were at the conference."

"Speaking of the conference, Seto also told me what you two and your friend, Leon, did while you were there," Bono informed him, changing the subject.

Mokuba smiled blushingly. "Yeah, I can't believe we got away with it." He laughed nervously.

"Your brother feels a bit guilty about it, I think."

"Why? If we hadn't done it, Seto would have been blamed for stealing the watch and the other things. We… we would have been sent back to the orphanage." Mokuba gulped. "I… I don't want to go back there anymore."

_Anymore?_

"And, Seto doesn't want to go back there, either. He has plans here, and I'm going to support him. He's my brother."

* * *

"I've heard things were interesting at the conference," Bono mentioned to Noah the next day, interrupting his practice, leaving Seto in the other room to play on his own.

"Interesting, puh!" Noah scoffed. "Where did you hear that?"

"Your brothers."

Noah became rigid and his face turned bright red with anger. "They are _not_ my brothers. They're scum, and you shouldn't have to teach them, Bono."

"It's not like they're _essential_ to anything. Father plans on getting rid of them as soon as possible; he _promised_ me. And, Seto's nothing but a schemer. He's _bad_, Bono."

"How so?" Bono asked gently. No one can resist opening up to Bono. All he needed to do was wait.

"…Something he did at the conference," Noah mumbled, fiddling with the strings in his violin.

"…He put them in the middle of my bed. My _bed!_ He was laughing at me! I mean, I had to give them to the little von Schroeder to get them back into his father's room. Then, the little twerp laughed at me, too! Can you believe that?"

Noah's ranting continued for a while longer, disparaging the worth of his brothers, as well as spiting the von Schroeders, and finally complaining and asking why his father didn't see him as being enough.

"Your father doesn't know what he has," Bono finally said calmly.

Noah snorted. "You're telling me."

"…Noah, what happened to that little kitten you used to feed? You haven't mentioned it for about a month."

"Oh, Socrates? …he went away. I guess the dogs must have frightened him, or something." Noah looked downtrodden for a moment, before picking himself up and dismissing the cat. "It's not like I would have been able to keep it, anyway. The dogs definitely would have gotten it then."

* * *

It was just Noah and Mokuba for lunch again.

With Gozaburo back at work and not there to supervise, Seto didn't feel the need to come down anymore, instead choosing to get ahead on his work during the hour they were given for lunch. He'd invited Mokuba to come sit with him. It wasn't that he skipped lunch. The reason that he'd asked Mokuba to scope out the kitchen was so that he wouldn't have to follow the specific schedules of mealtimes. At the orphanage, they'd sometimes punished the kids by denying them supper, which was another eventuality that Seto had wanted to be prepared for.

Just after he'd completed his two-week ultimatum, Seto had used one of his lunch hours to go charm the entire kitchen staff in much the same way he'd charmed Anna. Now, they knew him and always sent his lunch with Anna to his room rather than the breakfast room. They also knew who Mokuba was and had "orders" to treat him the same as they did Seto.

Mokuba didn't go to sit with Seto, however. His reasoning: he didn't think it would be nice to leave Noah alone. Seto had been dubious, but he wasn't able to change Mokuba's mind. If Noah for some reason stopped eating in the breakfast room, then Mokuba would go and eat with Seto. Until then, he was going to stay and keep Noah company, even if the teal-haired boy didn't appreciate it.

"Why don't you go and eat with your brother? Does he find you as annoying as the rest of us do?" Noah taunted. Mokuba jumped. This was the first time Noah had ever actually addressed him while they were alone.

"N-no. I'd just rather eat down here," Mokuba answered, poking the red gelatin on his plate with a fork, watching it jiggle.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you not to play with your food?" Noah asked from across the table.

Mokuba shook his head. "Nope."

"Really?" Mokuba looked up. There was actual curiosity in Noah's face.

"Really. My… my mama was really fun and stuff. She always had us doing things, playing games, like what the clouds looked like, what we could turn out food into, how many red cars we could count going by our house…" Mokuba gave the gelatin another, sad poke. "…She was really fun and really sweet…"

"Oh, please," Noah ridiculed. No one's mother was that fun. Mother's were to be admired when they were seen on the arms of the fathers, they were to make sure the children obeyed the rules the fathers laid down. They were not about having fun and adoring one's children… not that Noah knew, at least.

"She was!" Mokuba defended. "She always was doing stuff to "exercise our brains" and to "help us not take life so seriously." She even used to make Seto smile."

Noah glared disbelievingly at Mokuba.

"She… she would do stuff, like when she thought Seto was acting not like a kid should, she'd just go sit in front of him for a while and just start laughing. After while, he wouldn't have a choice but to laugh, too. And, she could be sneaky about it, too. Once, when we were at the beach, she and I each made our own sand castle, but Seto wouldn't because he said that it was a little kid thing to do. So, once she finished, she knocked him over into hers and told him that he had to rebuild the one he just destroyed."

Noah snorted at that, and even smiled a bit.

Mokuba continued, encouraged. "And, when he said no, she grabbed him up and dumped him in the sea!"

Noah actually laughed.

"Then, they got into this big splash fight, but finally Seto had to give up, so he came running back and used me as a shield, but he couldn't stop laughing, and eventually he just ended up rolling around in the sand, giggling and snorting salt water out of his nose!"

Noah himself couldn't stop laughing; the imagery of perfect, cool Seto having all those things done to him was just too much.

Mokuba smiled hugely at the sight of Noah acting his age for once, too.

"And, basically, we couldn't find Dad all day that day, and eventually Seto disappeared like he sometimes just would and does, and we found them up by the car finally, with Dad buried up to the neck in sand and Seto building a sandcastle around his head."

Noah's laughter stopped. "Your dad let you do stuff like that?"

"Yeah. Supposedly he was a real grouch before he met Mama, but I never saw him act that way. Seto's basically a clone of him, or he was before. Even now, if you give Seto my hair and eyes, you'd have a young version of him."

"…I don't look anything like my father," Noah said dully.

"What about your mom?" Mokuba questioned innocently.

"My…my mother…" Mokuba waited. "My mother is no business of yours!" Noah suddenly shouted, stunning and frightening Mokuba.

Noah pushed his chair back and left the room, leaving a hurt and confused Mokuba behind.

* * *

"Noah."

Noah gulped. "Yes, Father."

"Why did you consort with the von Schroeder boy?" Gozaburo asked genially. The desk in Gozaburo's home office was between the sitting Gozaburo and standing Noah, but was providing no barrier whatsoever.

"Wh-what do you mean—?"

Gozaburo slammed his open palm down on the desk, but didn't say a word.

"…I'm sorry, Father," Noah finally whimpered, the tension in the air getting to him.

"Answer me why, Noah."

"Be-because, Seto deserved it, Father. He never should have been allowed to think he was a Kaiba. He never should have been allowed to have anything to do with us."

"Do you have any new arguments, or are you just going to repeat the same, tired cases again and again?" Gozaburo asked cruelly, evil yellow eyes glaring coldly at his son.

"I-I…"

"Are you insane, Noah?" Gozaburo asked, seemingly out of the blue, as he leaned forward in his seat.

"What? …Uh, no!" _Why would his father ask such a thing?_ "Of course not, Father."

"Then, why do you seem to insist upon acting like your mother?"

Noah froze. "…I thought we were never going to talk about that again. That's what you said, Father," Noah said monotonously.

"We weren't, except that I needed to drive a point home, Noah. Your mother was institutionalized before our divorce because she had a "mental breakdown," one of many, when I told her about Seto and Mokuba. _You_, Noah, are acting much like she did before her breakdown."

"I'm not insane, Father," Noah quickly said.

"Hmph. While that remains to be seen, I was more focused on the fact that you were merely acting like your mother, your mother who I divorced because I could no longer stand. Do you understand Noah?"

"Y-yes, Father."

"Stop stuttering," Gozaburo harshly commanded. He leaned even further forward.

"This is _it_, Noah," he continued spitting out. "I would have applauded you for incriminating Seto but for two things. One, you worked with the _enemy_ of Kaiba Corp. How in God's damnable name am I supposed to trust you with the running of Kaiba Corp. if you're consorting with those who would love to see it brought down? And, two, you FAILED!" Gozaburo roared. "Not only did you fail, but Seto _bested_ you, _again_. If you don't get your act together, I may have to name another successor to the Kaiba legacy."

Noah's jaw dropped and his eyes began as wide as saucers.

_Never_ had Noah ever expected that the arrival of the two orphans would lead to him losing Kaiba Corp. They were just here to provoke him into doing better than he had been doing; they weren't actually in the running for the position of Gozaburo's successor.

But, for his father to have said that…

"But, Father—"

"Get out, Noah," Gozaburo growled. "_Get OUT!_"

He followed the scrambling Noah and slammed the door behind him.

* * *

Noah wandered the halls, dazed on the outside, but _seething_ on the inside.

_It's Seto's fault, and Mokuba's. It's all their fault._

It wasn't his father's fault, not at all. His father loved him. Noah knew his father loved him. Gozaburo _had_ to love him. He was his father.

_I'll kill Seto if he stops my father from loving me._

Noah didn't know where he was within the mansion. Maybe in the Westward Wing?

He heard a bout of unexpected laughter down one of the hallways. A child's laughter.

_Mokuba._

How dare one of those brats be happy! Not when Noah was becoming more and more depressed and unwillingly to face a new day.

Following the sound, Noah meant to make it stop. _How dare he…_

Noah reached an afar door halfway down a corridor he'd turned onto. Through the gap, he saw Mokuba, giggling to himself, on the bed, as well as something else.

_Socrates?_

The white, black, and gray cat was bouncing all over the bed, chasing the plastic cap from a bottle of water.

This was where the cat had been for the past month? Noah remembered it disappearing around the time that the orphans had arrived, but he'd never connected the two. Gozaburo had forbid other pets besides his Chow Chows.

_First, they take over my home, next, they take away my father's love, and then, they take away my cat._

_How dare they._ _They cannot have my cat. If I can't have him, neither can they._

The bottle cap bounced off the bed and rolled andscattered to the door behind which Noah was concealed. Socrates followed, darting immediately to the makeshift toy.

The moment the cat was in reach, Noah swooped down and snatched it off the floor. Mokuba gasped and shot upright in the bed.

"You know you aren't supposed to have this."

* * *

"_Please_, Noah!" Mokuba begged, following on Noah's heels as the older boy headed for Gozaburo's office.

"I'll let Boots go myself; I'll make sure he never comes onto the property again, just please give him back!"

_Seto, I'm so sorry_.

Mokuba had done the one thing Seto had told him not to: he'd gotten caught with the cat.

"Please, Noah. Boots didn't mean any harm."

Noah stopped without warning, almost causing Mokuba to bump into him. He turned back with a sparkle of… something in eyes, something bad… vindictive.

"His name is '_Socrates_'," Noah finally spat out.

Mokuba frowned for a moment, not quite understanding, but, eventually, realization came to his face. "He's your cat," he breathed.

"He's no one's cat now," Noah declared before turning away again, stalking even more quickly to his father's office.

"I'm sorry, Noah. I didn't know. But please, don't take Boots to him. Don't take Socrates to him, _please!_"

Noah ignored Mokuba's pleadings that were now being strangled in hopeless tears.

And, now is when Noah should have paid attention to the courtyard passing in the windows below them. It was empty, and its regular occupants could be found sniffing the air at the top of the staircase, just a single corner away from where Noah and Mokuba now walked, directly towards them.

* * *

"You will _not_ embarrass Noah like that again," was the last thing Gozaburo was able to say to Seto before hell broke loose.

Seto had been called in after Noah to have his own head chewed off, the differences being that Noah had been scared by his father and Seto bored by him. He knew that Gozaburo was only out to save his own ass should Seto decide to humiliate Noah again, just in case it should spread from singularly Noah to the entire original Kaiba family.

Seto had mostly tuned out of reality by then, but not enough to avoid hearing the screams and snarls coming from within the house.

It had taken less than a second to discern Mokuba's cries from the rest of the tumult, and once he did, Seto was out of the office like a shot.

He followed the horrific sounds out of the Eastward Wing and to the over-hanging balcony overlooking the foyer. He'd never forget what he saw.

Noah and Mokuba were both cornered against the wall opposite the banister by Fu Xi and Nu Wa. They were clawing their way up trying to reach the cat that Noah held aloft in his arms, above his head.

Noah lashed out with his legs, kicking Nu Wa in the face, enraging the dog. Nu Wa attacked his legs that were exposed by the shorts he was wearing, savaging them. Noah screamed bloody murder, trying to kick her off again, but only inducing her to now also claw at the limbs.

Fu Xi still had his murderous sights on the cat that was going ballistic in Noah's grasp, and the dog was using Mokuba to get to it. Mokuba, more concerned with the cat than himself, tried to push the dog off, and finally succeeded, only to have it get right back up and swipe its paw across his face, leaving a bloody trail.

Mokuba was knocked to the ground by the force of the large dog's blow, which was when Seto came to the protection of his baby brother.

Shoving Fu Xi away completely, Seto reached up and tore the cat from Noah's hands, before lowering himself and quickly jerking Mokuba to his feet, pushing the cat into his small arms.

Nu Wa stayed occupied with Noah's legs, but Fu Xi made for Boots again.

Seto jumped forward to meet it, kicking it powerfully in the side, causing it to stumble and go down. He grabbed his little brother and practically threw him down the stairs.

"Get out of here!"

* * *

Gozaburo watched as Seto tackled Fu Xi and pushed Mokuba out of the fight, who then went sprinting down the stairs at his brother's command, taking the cat with him. Seto had turned to the second dog, Nu Wa, who was tearing at Noah's legs from where he stood pressed against the wall, trying to kick the dog away, but was stopped as Fu Xi jumped on him, almost forcing him down.

Watching, not yet helping, Gozaburo began to feel thoughts forming in regards to his two sons, one who was crying and squealing in his fear, unable to move, and one who was fighting, not only to help himself, but to get the other out of danger as well.

Seto was able to push Fu Xi off of him again, and once again turned to try to grab Nu Wa off of Noah's exposed, punctured, bleeding legs.

_Never turn your back to the enemy._

Fu Xi attacked again, chomping down on Seto's ankle, dragging him backwards, away from the other fight.

Seto slammed his fist into the dog's nose, forcing it to release him, but he was never able to get back to Noah, Fu Xi keeping all of his attention.

Finally, after observing how each to the boys dealt with this… predicament, Gozaburo decided to intervene.

"_Fu Xi! Nu Wa! _RELEASE!" Gozaburo roared, thinking the well-versed command would be enough to call the dogs off. But, they were too incensed, too full of bloodlust at this point to follow anything but their instincts. Instincts that were telling them to kill.

Their vicious attack continued, and when Seto was pulled off-balance by Fu Xi, down to kneel before the Chow, his throat at level with the dog's jaws, Gozaburo realized how far gone the dogs were, and that it would take more than his paltry commands to stop them.

* * *

Fu Xi lunged at Seto, open maw intended for the boy's jugular. Throwing up an arm, Seto was thrown to his back under the weight of the dog, his arm clamped tightly between the dog's fangs. Seto couldn't help himself and screamed as Fu Xi thrashed his head back and forth, tearing its teeth through the flesh of Seto's forearm. Seto tried to beat the dog off, bringing his free arm up and forcefully slamming it against the dogs face. Fu Xi merely turned his attention to this new appendage, burying his teeth in it. Another scream escaped Seto.

He now also had to deal with the dog's scrabbling forelegs on either side of his small torso. Fu Xi's claws were ripping through the fabric of his clothes and the skin beneath as it tried to hold down its prey. Occasionally one of the dog's large paws would attempt to find purchase atop his frame, but Seto was continuously wracking his body about, refusing to let the dog to fully pin him down, creating new scrapes and cuts every time he thrashed his body out from under the claws.

_When is it going to stop?_

Seto was getting tired while Fu Xi seemed to have endless reserves of ferocious energy.

Suddenly, Fu Xi released the arm in his mouth and made another dive for Seto's throat. Twisting just in time, Seto removed his neck from the dog's path, putting his shoulder there instead, upon which the dog bit down furiously and again began whipping Seto's body about by the hold on his shoulder.

Gradually, unexpectedly, a memory of this dog swiping its giant paw across Mokuba's face, leaving a streak of blood behind, entered Seto's mind. Blinking tears of pain and anger from his eyes and drawing on the fury the image filled him with, Seto was able to pull his legs up between himself and the dog and kicked the brute off of him.

The growling, slavering beast was about to come at him again when it was unexpectedly caught in a chokehold of sorts and dragged away from Seto.

* * *

Reinforcements had arrived upon hearing the fight occurring in the hallway above the great foyer. Several servants had come running, most of them holding back, but a few of the menservants coming to help.

Seeing this, Gozaburo had ordered one of them to capture Nu Wa off of Noah's shredded legs while he himself caught Fu Xi away from Seto.

Upon being relieved of the dogs, Noah slumped to the ground, crying out weakly as his ragged and tattered legs made contact with the floor. Seto just relaxed where he was already lying, allowing his head to fall back on the floor, but keeping one of his torn up arms cradled on his chest, lifting the other to put pressure upon his rapidly bleeding shoulder.

Gozaburo looked back at the boys as he wrestled with the snarling and snapping Chow Chow. Though both looked as if they could pass out any moment, there were subtle differences in the two even now. Seto was still but for the heavy pumping of his lungs with in chest, showing nothing but relief that the struggle was over. Noah, however, was shivering madly, unable to quell they fear that the dogs had inspired. Every now and then, his unsteady gaze would dart to Seto lying only a few feet from him now that the battle was over, and something more than fear would spark up in it.

_Seto is the stronger,_ Gozaburo thought. _If only he was not so willing to sacrifice himself for others._ Gozaburo's eyes narrowed as they focused on his "true" son. _Noah was weak from beginning to end, and was the reason there was trouble in the first place._

Noah's eyes darted to his father, still wrestling with the dog that had led the attack. He looked as he did when he'd been younger and fallen over, begging for Gozaburo to come help him up.

Seto took his hand from his shoulder, and, on wobbling arms, began to push himself up to a sitting position.

After seeing Seto help himself, Gozaburo turned his gaze back to his biological son, seeing the helplessness in his eyes. Glaring for a moment at the disappointment that Noah was proving himself to be, Gozaburo turned his back, wanting nothing to do with him at that moment.

Grappling the dogs over to the other men, he heard one of them say, "They look bad, but I don't think they need to go to the hospital. We could get a doctor here to stitch them up and they'd probably be alright. We just need to stop the bleeding 'til then."

"Then, that's what we'll do," Gozaburo grunted. "Two of you, take the dogs and lock them in the courtyard until I figure out what to do with them."

"Yes, Mr. Kaiba." One of the menservants came forward to take Fu Xi.

At the precise moment Gozaburo handed the practically rabid Fu Xi of to one of the servants, another fight broke out behind him.

* * *

Seto had been able to rise to his feet as the adults talked, and had walked the few steps over to Noah. Just because he didn't like the brat, that didn't mean he wished him _this_ sort of harm, though he sometimes wondered…

Noah didn't wonder at all, especially not now. The only thought that was able to break through a wall of hurt and rage was that he had seemed pathetic and useless in front of his father while Seto had been powerful, in-control.

He'd said it before, but this time, he truly and wholeheartedly meant it.

"_I wish it had killed you,_" he hissed when Seto was close. Seto looked confused for a moment, but then his blue eyes widened as he saw the feverish light in Noah's eyes and felt the truth of the words.

He took a step back just as Noah lunged for him. They fell in a tangle of already injured legs and arms, Noah attempting to do as Fu Xi had and wrap his fingers around Seto's windpipe. Seto kicked his head back out of the way and lashed out with his feet, connecting with Noah's bloody, wretched legs. When that didn't stop the teal-haired boy, Seto pulled one of his arms back and let it fly, connecting with Noah's nose and mashing it flat into his face, making Noah howl in pain.

Neither heard the shouts around them, nor realized where they were heading with their brawling, until, side by side, they felt the floor give out beneath them. Identical cobalt eyes met in alarm for an instant until their tumbling down the stairs broke their locked gazes.

Limbs were caught and yanked out of the railing occasionally, one's weight would crush the other every now and then, and punches and kicks were still being exchanged as often as possible on the way down to the foyer.

Finally, both of their heads met the marble-tiled floor, each with a terrifying _crack!_ that had all of the gathered staff shouting in distress.

"_Son!_" Gozaburo's bellowed scream of distress was the last, muffled thing that either Seto or Noah heard before they each passed out.

* * *

"Mokuba, what in God's good name are you doing here? What's happened?" Sister Mary Therese asked, way beyond concerned for the boy. How did he get here? His new home and the orphanage were on the outlying areas of Domino in opposite directions of one another. How could he have been _allowed_ to get here?

A young white cat dabbled in black and gray was struggling in Mokuba's arms, having been confined to them for hours now. Mokuba's arms were now covered in scrapes and scratches from the kitten's scrabbling claws. But, several other spots of blood were dribbled and splashed across Mokuba's clothes, some from Noah, some from himself. A cut on his cheek had scabbed over, but a short, thin trail of dried blood had dried to his face from the scored flesh. Had no one seen and been distressed or alarmed by the sight of the boy as he made his way across town?

Sister Mary Therese had unfortunately seen worse in her time at the orphanage with the new arrivals, but it was, in ways, even more despicable to see innocent little Mokuba, one of the sweetest kids she'd ever met during her time here, so… _abused_ looking.

What was going on?

"Mokuba," the nun gentled her tone, seeing how restless Mokuba still was from whatever ordeal he'd gone through. "Why are you at the orphanage? Where's your brother?"

The little boy suddenly let out a strident, choked sob, startling the cat and the nun.

"I don't know!" Mokuba wailed. "I didn't even see Seto. He just pulled me out of the way and told me to run, and I did. On the buses here, I-I kept trying to remember if maybe he'd said something else to me, but… I don't know!" He was overtaken with sobbing.

"The buses, Mokuba?" Sister Mary Therese eventually tried to coax from Mokuba. Any information would be something at this point.

"The ones that brought me here," he answered through his tears.

Acting abruptly again, Mokuba practically tossed the cat in his arms at Sister Mary Therese.

"You told me once that you never turned away anyone that came to your doors, right?" Mokuba hurriedly got out, a feverish hope and neediness burning in his eyes.

"Mokuba, I meant people," the nun responded, juggling the cat now in her arms.

"But, you'll still take him, too, won't you?" Mokuba's eyes flared even brighter.

"Ah…" Sister Mary Therese sighed. "Yes, Mokuba, I'll take him," she gave in.

A relieved, semi-happy smile came to Mokuba's face under his tears. "His name's 'Boots'," he informed her.

"Boots," the Sister repeated."Mokuba, why are you giving him to the orphanage?" Maybe he'd answer this question.

And, he looked for a moment as if he might. Instead, he turned heel and ran from where they stood in the adoption center's doorway.

"Mokuba!" she called after him.

"Because," he whispered to himself as he ran, "I live in a place where something that can't defend itself, can't survive."

**Since I already know people are going to say it, I might as well just say it myself: Poor, Mokie TT-TT. This fic seems to constantly require putting him in the position of a victim.**

**Also, I've completely done away with my word-count goal. It just wasnt feasible ****when almost halfway through I haven't been able to get even one chapter to that goal.**

**Anyway, thanks for reading! Chapter 5 will, for sure, be posted January 2, 2011. **


	5. Alike

**Important thing for everyone to know: this is set five years into the future. I can't stress that enough, because if you don't know, things are going to become really confusing really quickly.**

**Chapter 5: Alike **

_Five years later_

"Mr. Kaiba?" the secretary buzzed through the intercom.

"Mm? Yes, what is it?"

"Your son, sir—"

"Which son?" Gozaburo questioned impatiently.

"Seto, sir. He's requesting to see you."

Gozaburo chuckled darkly to himself. He doubted Seto "requested" anything. Demanded was more like it. The boy was so much like himself…

"Let him in. I have a free moment." Not that the lad would settle for anything else.

Just as he suspected, the boy came barging in before Cathleen, the semi-ancient secretary, could have even let him know that Gozaburo was willing to see him.

"Hello, Pops," Seto greeted, a smirk on his face and glitter in his eye.

Gozaburo winced. Seto was never going to grow out of calling him that, was he?

_Not after five years of it, no._

"What do you want, boy? I'm busy."

Seto snorted. "I forgot how time consuming staring off into space could be for an old man," he scoffed, coming to stand before his adoptive father's desk.

Gozaburo's tawny mud-colored eyes narrowed to a glare. "What your mouth, boy."

"Make me, _Pops_," Seto shot off, grinning viciously before backing up to take a seat.

"What's on your mind, Seto?" Seto didn't intrude on him for any small reason, after all.

"Simple: Mokuba's bored," Seto stated, flicking a piece of lint off the sleeve of his black, unbuttoned suit jacket.

Gozaburo sighed, annoyed at being interrupted by such an unimportant matter. "And, what am _I_ to do about it? I thought you had a handle on your little brother's needs."

"I do. But, _you_ are the one in charge of his tutoring. To put it blankly, Mr. Worrshaw is a fossil that needs to be shelved. Mokuba practically has as much time on his hands as he did when we first arrived, and he's not learning a damn thing." Seto's expression was beginning to harden.

Gozaburo snorted. "Do try not to exaggerate things. He must be learning something, and I thought you would be proud of the kid for keeping up with his studies so well."

"Oh, I am." Whatever rapscallion joviality had been on Seto's face when he came in was now vanished. Mokuba was something he didn't joke about. "But, he could be learning even more valuable lessons in a real school."

Gozaburo actually laughed. "I disagree, boy. His education is so far above what any school could teach that, if Mokuba is sent anywhere, I say it should be college." He was not by any means praising his youngest son; just making a point.

"Anyway, do you really expect me to believe that just because you're a genius that means your little brother is as well?" Gozaburo scoffed offhandedly. Again, though he called Seto a genius, he was not praising him, merely stating things to be as they were. To say otherwise about the second eldest Kaiba boy would just be false.

A slim, cheerless smile came to Seto's lips, the one that had been developing over the years and only came out when Seto was gearing up to play someone.

Gozaburo had seen this smile more times than he cared to count.

"Just because Mokuba is not a genius, that doesn't mean he's not extremely intelligent. And, it seems to me that _you're_ the one who prays more for genius running through the family than I do," Seto unworriedly jabbed, seeming to lose interest in what Gozaburo was saying.

Gozaburo's face turned blotchy and red. "I still don't see the need for Mokuba to go to a school, _especially_ when he might also be fairly smart, if he can learn what he needs to at home, away from the commoners," Gozaburo persisted.

"What about socialization?" Seto asked.

"What about it?"

Seto chuckled dangerously. "You have three sons. Two of them are beyond any real socializing at this point, both too entrenched in their own preferred methods of dealing with people. Not to mention that one of them is a head case," Seto muttered the last part to himself, gaining Gozaburo's suspicious gaze. "It might be a good idea to have at least _one_ person in the family capable of playing nice with _the commoners_, don't you think? Just think of the wonderful PR he could bring if he turned out to be the 'nice' Kaiba."

"And, the _nurturing_ and _encouraging_ environment of your average high school is where he would learn to be this 'nice' guy?" Gozaburo questioned sarcastically, baring his blunt teeth in a superior grin.

"Better than at a house plagued with dog attacks and murderous siblings," Seto said coolly, fixing Gozaburo with a steady look that had the old man turning to look away.

The events of five years ago were, and always would be, Seto's trump card in dealing with his father. '_Guilt_' wasn't quite the word for what harassed Gozaburo's conscience when the back-to-back conflicts of first the dog attack and then the staircase incident were brought up, but it was very close. And, whenever Seto brought it up again, it was like it reopened a quietly festering wound, twisting Gozaburo into an unwilling submission. But, that was only half of what it did.

Seto had changed after that day. Everyone had, but Seto's had been the most… impressive. He hadn't been quiet or yielding before when it came to his beliefs, but he'd become exceptionally fervent afterwards, ruthless in the pursuit of what he wanted, not that anyone could figure out what it was he really wanted anymore, unable to follow his chessboard-style logic and tactics. And, even more disconcerting for Gozaburo, who had tried to get Seto back under his thumb numerous times only to have him slip right back out from under it, Seto had gained the ability to laugh daringly at the threats Gozaburo directed at him, all of which ended up being bluffs, seeming not to care if they were true or not.

He'd survive.

"Does your brother even want to go to a real school?" Gozaburo asked, stalling.

"It's what _I_ want," Seto replied firmly. _There's no way Mokuba's going to spend the rest of his teenage life with that crypt keeper of a tutor._

Cobalt and mustard eyes met in a stand-off in a ritual that had begun before Gozaburo even knew Seto's name, neither wanting to back down. Gozaburo's eyes slipped for a half a second, resting momentarily on the slight bit of shoulder and collarbone Seto's jacket and shirt didn't quite cover, showing off a line of scar tissue left over from Fu Xi's jaws.

Gozaburo was unable to keep his eyes steadily fixed on Seto's after that.

"Fine," the grayed man spat. "But, you are the one who finds the school and makes sure that everything runs smoothly, got it?"

"Got it." Reaching into his jacket, Seto pulled a parcel of papers from an inner pocket and threw them onto Gozaburo's desk.

"Just sign on the dotted lines and Mokuba can begin next Monday," Seto said.

Gozaburo had had a trial-filled life, the biggest trial of all being the seventeen-year-old in front of him, but it would figure that he would falter every once in a while when it came to the hard-won stone façade he'd cultivated over the decades. Allowing himself to smile at the arrogance Seto exhibited by arranging everything before he'd even gotten Gozaburo's approval as one of those times.

Nevertheless, he went through and wrote his name wherever it was needed, handing Mokuba off to some unknown school, giving Seto just the slightest bit more control over him every time he did.

When he was finished, Seto gathered the signed papers and stood up to his full height. Gozaburo watched in annoyance as his blue eyes flicked smugly up and down Gozaburo's sitting figure. Ever since the boy had unexpectedly shot up and topped Gozaburo in height when he was fifteen, looking like a distended skeleton as he did, Seto had rubbed his new 6' 1" stature in Gozaburo's 5' 9" high face.

"Later, Pops," he said, the twinkle back in his eye.

"Hm. Just leave now. I'm sure you have plenty of work to do," Gozaburo grumblingly dismissed, turning to his phone.

Calling through the intercom, Gozaburo barked, "Cathleen, find Lector for me and tell him to get in here… Cathleen? …_Cathleen? _Where is that woman?"

"Ask Noah," Seto suggested snarkily from the door. "Maybe if your son would stop flirting with her for a minute she'd get some work done."

* * *

It may not have been flirting, per se, but Noah did spend a lot of time schmoozing over the fifty-nine-year-old.

Cathleen was smart, capable, which had kept her in her job for all these long, trying years, and also oddly, though fortunately enough for Noah, child-loving. She'd known Noah ever since he'd "been a little tyke, no taller than his father's knee." She still saw him as the toddler that Gozaburo had occasionally brought in to work and had her look after when Noah's mother was having one of her 'episodes.'

All the grandmotherly crap set Noah's teeth on edge, but she was the one who knew everything that went on in Kaiba Corp., from the lower levels all the way to the top floor. Everything that ended up on Gozaburo's desk passed across Cathleen's first. So, he figured he may as well use the connection she'd already formed with him for his own purposes. Waste not, want not.

"Hello, Cathleen," he cooed to the gray-haired woman as he sidled up to her desk.

"Hello, Master Noah," she greeted, quickly finishing whatever she'd been typing at. Looking up at him, she gleefully squealed, "You have new glasses, Noah!"

Noah did his best to twist his lips in an endearing grin, using it as his praise for her recognizing the obvious. The gold wire-framed glasses contrasted with his teal hair beautifully and helped to distract from his unnaturally thin face and semi-hollow cheeks, as well as to hide the angel to which his nose slightly bent off to after having been broken. Noah had gone through a growth spurt about the same time Seto had, but Noah had never been able to put back on enough weight to make up for the drain the growing had put on his body, and he hadn't reached the same height as Seto, either, coming in less than an inch shorter than his father.

_Another reason to hate the Interloper._

"How are you today, Noah? How's home-life?" the matronly Cathleen asked, seemingly to actually care about his answer.

He sighed pitifully. "Same old, same old," he answered, overdoing it a bit by clasping his hands behind his back and scuffing his shoe against the ground.

"Oh, poor dear," Cathleen comforted, not taking notice of the drama-queen behavior. That's what Noah liked about her: she fell for everything he did. "Is Seto being mean to you again?"

"Yeah. 'Four-eyes' was added to the list last night before father got home." 'The list' was the list of names Seto fictitiously called Noah at home and when they were alone. Again, it was a case of Cathleen swallowing anything Noah said. Seto had come home _with_ Gozaburo last night, and had gone straight to the kitchen in the back of the house and then to Mokuba's room to check on him and hang out for a little while before bed.

"How unoriginal." Cathleen missed Noah's eye twitching at her comment. "Are you sure you wouldn't like me to tell you father what he does when he's not around? It's his fault for bringing the boy in, in the first place. He should know what a horrible brother he's being to you."

"No, but thank you for offering, Cathleen. I'm sure I'll manage until he leaves, which Father says should be soon." Under _no_ circumstances could Gozaburo be told of anything that Noah said to Cathleen. Especially, when every word of it was a useless lie.

"Alright, Noah. Be strong." She patted Noah's hand where he'd placed it on her desk in consolation. He withdrew his hand the moment she lifted her.

"There is something you could do for me, Cathleen, that might make me feel better." Noah now added in a weak tone to his voice. "I didn't get much of a chance to eat anything this morning; Seto was in too much of a hurry to go. Could you go and get me something? I'd do it myself, but I'm feeling a bit dizzy," he sheepishly confessed.

God, he felt like rolling his own eyes at himself.

"Of course, dearie. Here, come and sit behind my desk, and I'll go get you something from the break room." She gently guided the teenager into her seat and made her way down the hall to the elevators. "I'll be right back," she called as she waited for the doors to close behind her.

Noah gave her a feeble little wave and a fragile smile.

The moment the doors had closed, Noah leaned forward and began to scan what she'd typed on her computer. It had been a while since he'd done a scan of her system from the inside, and it was impossible to get into from the outside.

Gozaburo wasn't dumb. With two masterminded sons interested in computers, he knew that the company's files wouldn't be safe if one or both of them decided to go pillaging. So, the first thing that Gozaburo had assigned his sons to do once he terminated their formal education was to build a firewall together that would keep any and all hackers from getting into the system. Frankly, either one could have done it by themselves, but that was the point of getting them both to do it. That way no backdoors would be left for them to slip through once the firewall was complete, the two boys making sure to check the other's work extra carefully so that neither would get any unfair advantage. That knowledge hadn't stopped either of them from making their attempts, but Seto had almost immediately plugged any holes that Noah may or may not have intentionally left for himself, and Noah found it so easy to find all of Seto's that, by the end, he was barely even trying any longer to catch them; they were just there.

But, due to each other's abilities, now neither was able to access anything they weren't expressly allowed to, like personnel or budgets. Cathleen, though, was allowed to view all of that sort of thing from the comfort of her custom-built computer chair, taking advantage of all it had to offer. And, Noah, having been taught to never look down on an opportunity, was taking full advantage if her.

Today's chance, however, was interrupted.

"_Cathleen,"_ his father's voice boomed across the intercom, making Noah jump and twitch horribly,_ "find Lector for me and tell him to get in here… Cathleen? …Cathleen? Where is that woman?"_

_Lector, hm? He's usually interesting_,Noah thought to himself.

Slinking out from behind Cathleen's desk, Noah skittered back down the hall from where he'd come.

Cathleen's old office now belonged to Seto and Noah, whose desks were bolted flush against each other so that the two had no choice but to face one another when they were both at work there. Another of Gozaburo's cruel jokes that also acted as a test to keep the boys in line.

The room had basically been sliced down the middle, along the line that the two desks formed where they met. And, as far as Noah was concerned, he had gotten the better half, the half with the wall separating this office from Gozaburo's.

Having been Cathleen's room prior, she knew the in's and out's of it, including the secret door that led between the offices. Upon first arriving, Cathleen had pointed this out to him alone, and it had proved to be an almost invaluable tool, rivaling even his frequent trips into the secretary's hardware, allowing Noah to listen in on his father's personal conversations with ease, and even watch by pushing the door open just a hair, just enough for a slit of the other room to be visible.

Now, he just needed to wait for Lector to arrive, and then the fun would begin.

_

* * *

_

Lurking again

, Seto thought as he entered and saw his stepbrother in their shared office, doing nothing in particular except lean against a particular slate on the wall separating them from Gozaburo.

Five years as brothers and Seto could count on his fingers how many times they'd actually spoken to each other after the fall. Not including the insults traded whenever "Daddy's" back was turned and one or the other of them was in a particularly Kaiba sort of mood (some of which had made factual entries on 'the list'). It had never escalated to the point that Noah had repaid Seto for the broken nose he'd received when they were twelve, or to where Noah had his shattered for a second time, but that was because they were so careful to ignore each other now.

Noah didn't focus his gaze on Seto at all, and Seto removed his the second after he'd attached it. Making his way over to his desk, he took out a key that was specific to his filing cabinets and removed a few files.

He had a meeting in a few minutes with some lesser people in the Kaiba Corp. totem pole and needed the files in order to resolve a problem they'd been citing in the working of their branch of the company.

Noah didn't have his own work the way Seto did. Gozaburo said, and made Seto swear to go along with it, that he kept Noah by his side because he wanted Noah to learn the family business from family, rather than just hang him out to dry as he tried to portray what he was doing with Seto as. But, it was obvious to everyone that Gozaburo did not yet consider Noah capable enough to act as a free agent within the company as Seto was allowed to.

Noah had so far played dumb to this obvious lack of trust, but Seto, having felt what could happen when Noah snapped and having the scars to prove it, didn't necessarily want to be around when his usually pathetic competition finally blew his top.

* * *

Lector arrived several minutes after Seto had left, having finally been contacted and sent for.

He, just as Gozaburo did, bore traces of aging in the last five years, though he surely knew he was better off than the president of Kaiba Corp. Finally, after years of watching the man seemingly never age, Gozaburo was finally looking his age of sixty-seven. Having Noah so late in his years and then adopting two more boys had made white take over several of the streaks of gray that had already been in his hair, and the wrinkles upon his face had become more grooved and set, carving into his face.

Lector was amazed that Gozaburo still had the energy and the will to continue running Kaiba Corporations. But, maybe he didn't…

"Lector, if you had to choose a successor from between my sons, who would you choose?" Gozaburo abruptly asked, sounding tired after his sparring with Seto.

"Sir?" Could this mean what Lector and the Big Five had considered was coming true? Was Gozaburo too old for the job?

"Which son, Lector. Quickly now." Evidently his years had not affected his impatience.

"Noah, of course, sir," Lector answered dutifully.

Neither man heard the intake of breath seeming to come from the wall.

Gozaburo looked deep into Lector's eyes.

"Don't lie, Lector."

"Mr. Kaiba, I wasn't—"

"Yes, you were. Tell me, _why_ do you choose Noah?"

"Well," Lector felt as if he were falling into a trap. "He is the most like you, Mr. Kaiba. He is your real son, after all. I believe we could trust him to run the company as it has been run and hopefully always will be," Lector answered, praying to whatever deities may exist that he'd answered correctly.

Gozaburo just looked at Lector for a moment, before bringing his fingers up to massage his forehead and eyes.

"I swore that Noah would someday get the company. I also swore that Kaiba Corp. would get a president after me that would make sure that it thrived. I never thought that one oath would work against the other."

"Are they working against each other, sir?"

"Think again on why Noah should get the company. And, then tell me if the person who should get the company is the one who is most like me, then is not Seto just as much or more so a copy of me?"

"…You and Master Seto are alike, sir," Lector admitted uncomfortably.

"Yes. More than myself and Noah." Gozaburo chuckled to himself a little. _Right from the beginning, Seto knew this would happen. He knew that I didn't know what I was getting myself into. But he knew. That bastard of a twelve-year-old orphan knew._

Gozaburo couldn't help but be a little bit proud.

"Things have changed in ways that I hadn't predicted, Lector," Gozaburo continued. "It all changed, like the chessboard was thrown in the air and now I have to deal with the pieces that have fallen where they may."

"Sir, if I may say," Lector cautiously began, watching his boss carefully, "you haven't been the same since the boys… _tumbled_ down the stairs all those years ago."

"They haven't been the same either, have they," Gozaburo said quietly.

"Sir?"

"Seto is even more insolent and full of himself. He's gone beyond being strong and confidant." _He could take over Kaiba Corp. with his ego alone. _"Noah, though…"

Noah's eyes and ears strained from where he watched and listened, needing to know what his father thought of him. Needing to know he approved of him.

"I remember how just before Fu Xi and Nu Wa attacked the boys I told Noah that he was like the his mother, that he just might be insane."

Lector stiffened at the words, in shock.

"I didn't mean it," Gozaburo continued to confide. "But, ever since they both hit their heads, Seto has become increasingly self-assured and unconcerned about what others think, and Noah has become…"

"A little "touched," sir?" Lector warily supplied, hoping he wasn't over-stepping the wrong bounds.

"…I suppose that would be apt," Gozaburo agreed. "So, considering what you have just said, if you had to choose a successor to this company, would it be Noah?"

"…No, sir."

* * *

A little "touched" after the stairs?

_Is that really what they think I am?_

A little "touched"?

_What the hell did they mean by that?_

Seto and Gozaburo are alike.

_If it weren't for Seto, there wouldn't be any doubt that Father and I are the most alike._

Seto and Gozaburo are alike.

_Seto must pay for what he's done to my family._

Seto and Gozaburo are alike.

_Seto doesn't deserve this company._

Seto and Gozaburo are alike.

_Gozaburo doesn't deserve this company._

I _deserve this company. Not those two. I will have this company._

Seto and Gozaburo are alike.

_I'll see them both pay._

**Thank you for reading.**

**I realize now that I jumped the gun with certain things in the last chapter, so I'm sorry for that. And, I'm also sorry to those of you who were looking forward to seeing what happened after the dog and stair incidents. I'll focus a little more on that in the next chapter, so you'll get a bit more detail then.**

**Also, the next chapter and this one are not exactly out of order, but Chapter 6 isn't going to be quite as intense or plot-relevant as this one. I guess it's the final introductory-type chapter of the fic, so from here on out it's full-on plot material. **

**The next chapter update will be January 17, 2011.**


	6. Schemings in the Family

**I know some of you have been waiting a while for this next chapter to be out, and I would just like to thank you for being so patient with this being the most held-up chapter of all. And, a special thank you goes out to those who contacted me, wondering if I was okay; it meant a lot to me that you cared ^-^.**

**Random facts: Today is my first anniversary of joining , so I'll **_**try**_** (really, **_**really**_** hard) to publish a chapter of ****The One Friend of Seto Kaiba**** soon to celebrate, and today is also my cat's birthday. Go figure. **

**I don't own ****Yugioh!****.**

**Chapter Six: Schemings in the Family**

"What did you do to him?" Mokuba asked, eyes narrowed but trying to keep a hopeful smile from his face. He was lying on Seto's bed, watching as his brother got ready for tomorrow, hardly believing what was being told to him. Would he actually be allowed to go to a school? A _real_ school?

"What do you mean?" Seto asked, more successful than Mokuba at hiding his own pleasure. His back was turned to the bed and he was rustling around in his closet for something. In the five years since they'd arrived, neither had done much to make their rooms their own, but there was no doubting that this was Seto's. Files were stacked everywhere, most having some relevance to Kaiba Corp., though some being personal projects that Seto had dabbled in at one time or another and just hadn't gotten around to clearing away.

"You had to have twisted his arm somehow to get him to let me out," Mokuba continued, keeping his eyes fixed on the back of Seto's suit jacket.

"You sound as if you've been in a cage." Seto chuckled grimly, turning out of the closet and casting his brother a dry glance.

Mokuba snorted. "That's what it feels like. So, why am I now being allowed to go to a school when it was such an _abominable_ idea before?" He stumbled over the word 'abominable.'

"Because…" Seto trailed off as he kneeled down among a stack of papers, thumbing through them in an attempt to find what he wanted.

"Seto," Mokuba said, calling back the elder's attention.

"Because, Pops is old and knows he has a skewed view of the world. He also knows Noah and I have inherited our own versions of that view. You, however, have been kept from all of this "screwy-ness," and Pops sees the value in you being exposed to a more "average" outlook on life," Seto explained.

Mokuba watched Seto for a few moments as he continued delving in the piles of information. Finally, "Okay, why is Gozaburo _really_ letting me go to school?"

Seto laughed. Mokuba really was sharp.

"I have no idea why he gave in so easily," Seto confessed.

"Maybe he's rewarding you for being a good son," Mokuba suggested. "He seems to like you, you know."

"I'm sure," Seto sarcastically mumbled.

Mokuba just smiled wanly.

Seto found what he was looking for and handed it over to Mokuba.

"Here. This is a brochure for Domino High. No doubt they've glamorized the hell out of it, but there are class descriptions and options for extracurricular activities in it. I figured you'd like to pick out your own courses since I picked out the school."

"You think I'd actually be able to do stuff like sports and clubs or whatever?" Mokuba asked, excitement slipping into his voice.

"Why not? The old man doesn't care."

Mokuba stuck out his tongue. "Gee, _thanks_."

Seto sighed and began walking over to the closet again. "I didn't mean it like that, Mokuba."

"I know, I know." Mokuba began flipping through the brochure. "There's a dueling club," Mokuba remarked.

"Guns, swords, or cards?" Seto snarked, smirking to himself. He pulled off his suit jacket and tugged off his dress shirt, leaving him in his dress pants and a white undershirt.

"…"

Turning around, Seto looked to see why Mokuba had gone silent.

Mokuba was staring at Seto's bared arms and the marks that raced up along them, a pallor having come over his face. The scarring that had been inflicted upon Seto's forearms and shoulder, as well as Noah's legs, was a taboo subject within the house.

Fu Xi and Nu Wa had been sent back to the Chinese ambassador after the "incident," just barely avoiding being put down. But, even with the dogs gone and the damage ignored, the scars still existed, physical and otherwise.

Seto, even before the dogs and the stairs, had figured something was off about Noah. And, he knew something had changed within himself, as well. But, he worried the most about what happened to Mokuba.

None of the few wounds he had gotten had scarred, and he had been able to save the kitten, as well as avoid the fall down the stairs. But, to an eight-year-old, the impressions taken from that time would be life-altering.

Mokuba had disappeared with Boots, just like Seto had wanted; Gozaburo and the servants had barely noticed he was gone. When he had come back, sans Boots, he had asked where his brother was.

At first, Seto and Noah had merely needed stitches, but then they had engaged in their own fight and had fallen down the stairs. Everyone who had been in the vicinity had head as each of their heads had collided with the marble, black and white-checked floor. Once that had happened, it was decided that the hospital couldn't be avoided.

Mokuba hadn't been allowed to see his brother or be reassured by him for several days, during which he wasn't even told how his brother was doing. Eventually, Mokuba had accompanied Gozaburo on one of the man's multiple visits throughout the day and seen Seto just in time to have a breakdown in his hospital room.

Seto would never forget how Mokuba had cried and cried and apologized and apologized for what seemed like hours, though realistically couldn't have been. Just the few days he'd been alone had been enough for Mokuba to get it stuck in his own head that what had happened to Seto, and to Noah, had been all his fault for not listening when he'd been told not to bring another animal into the house. If he hadn't been selfish and needy and childish, everyone would have been fine, or so he reasoned. And, having the dogs still at the house, as well as having the threat that he may also be responsible for _their_ deaths over his head, hadn't helped.

Seto had been spending the last five years trying to get rid of that destructive mindset, but had only made so much progress. To make up for what he had brought about, Mokuba had become extremely willing to go along with the plans Seto had concocted over the years. And, he hadn't complained once over the years any time he had been left alone for what Seto saw as excessively long periods of time. Mokuba had wanted to show that he was no longer the same child who had caused the misfortune.

Seto hoped that being with other, carefree kids his own age would help Mokuba get over the responsibility the boy still felt for the catastrophe that, Seto felt, was really borne by every person who had the Kaiba name _besides_ Mokuba.

"Mokuba, it's not your fault," Seto said quietly, seriously, breaking his brother's concentration on the scars.

"Mm. Uh, yeah, I know," Mokuba lied, looking back down at the school's brochure, not seeing it at all.

Seto was a freely admitted opportunist, and he wasn't in any way opposed to using his scars to his advantage like he'd done earlier today, leaving his shoulder slightly exposed to throw Gozaburo's concentration off. But, he never wanted his little brother to be influenced by them, especially not in this way.

_Please, let the school help. Let Mokuba have a little normalcy. Let him be happy._

* * *

Seto and Noah shared the limo during the ride into Kaiba Corp. Seto sat on the far right, starring out the window, and Noah did the same on the far left. Neither realized as they sat in silence that they were each identically seated, as if they were reflected images of each other (one in black and one in white), with their legs crossed and arms propped on the arm rests, holding up their chins. The only differences were Seto being three inches taller and Noah's nose being off-center and having a pair of thinly gold-rimmed glasses balanced on it.

They reached their destination, and Seto immediately opened the door and stepped out while Noah waited for the driver to step out and open the door for him.

_Some things would never change, _Seto thought, shaking his head and rolling his eyes as Noah stepped out with an inherited pompous air. They ended up walking in side by side, most of the people in the lobby stopping what they were doing and watching, some of the nearer ones even greeting, the two young men as they made their way to the elevator.

"Mr. Seto!" a voice called as they reached the doors.

A woman assigned to Seto as a secretary/researcher leaped into the elevator with them before the doors shut.

"Karen," Seto acknowledged. In accordance with the unspoken rules between those affiliated with either of the elder Kaiba brothers, both Seto and Karen ignored Noah's presence.

"Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, sir, but your deal with Hiroshi Nauticals fell through. They _said_ that it was because they weren't ready for such a large corporate deal, but the idea of not being ready to go global so quickly just… doesn't jive. But, the full report is in here, so you can judge for yourself." She handed him a file folder marked with both the Hiroshi Nauticals and the Kaiba Corporation logos.

Seto's eyes narrowed. "I see. Thank you, Karen." He took the folder.

Hiroshi Nauticals hadn't been eager when Kaiba Corporation had contacted them, but when KC had sent Seto as their representative, HN hadn't been able to get over the fact that Seto was merely seventeen. The negotiations had only gone downhill after that, so it wasn't quite surprising that the other company had backed out, just disappointing.

"Again, sorry, sir," Karen apologized before ducking out on the twelfth floor.

As the elevator continued its ascent to the top floor, Noah let out a derisive chuckle, earning him a flaring, dangerous glance from Seto.

"Don't worry about it, Seto," Noah began. "I'm sure you'll have plenty of worse losses in your future." Noah chuckled… Seto joined him.

Noah stopped abruptly and watched as Seto continued with the merriment that Noah had started.

Wiping a fake tear of mirth from his eye as the doors opened, Seto said, "That's hilarious coming from you, Noah. Especially considering that you haven't had so much as a _chance_ to mess up under Pops' constant supervising. But, don't worry," Seto continued, stepping out of the elevator and having to turn back to keep up to his dialogue, "you'll get your opportunity to royally fuck yourself, and, most likely, it'll be the first time Daddy Dearest let's you do that _one_ thing on your own. You know, like tie your own shoes… Later, Noah."

Noah stood petrified with fury as Seto walked away from him, unable to do anything but nervously tic even as the elevator doors closed on him and someone called the elevator down.

Meanwhile, Seto was greeting Cathleen and asking how she was.

"I'm quite fine, Seto," the fairly elderly secretary responded coolly. "And, you?" she asked unhappily.

"Better than Noah, anyway," he answered, smiling roguishly. "Is the old man in?"

"No, your esteemed father is _not_ in, Seto," Cathleen replied indignantly. Seto had suspected that Cathleen had had a crush on Gozaburo ever since he had divorced his first wife… whom Seto had never been able to find any facts on.

"What's he doing? Did he actually take a Saturday off for once in his life?"

"He is currently away with Misters Gansley, Johnson, and Lector. He will be back later and wishes to see you and your brother, then," she informed him aloofly, turning primly back to her computer.

"He wants to see Mokuba and me?" he provoked.

"No! You and Noah," she said affronted.

He smiled falsely at the secretary. "Noah is not my brother, and I'm sure he has said as much about me during your little _chats_. Remember that, Cathleen."

With that, he moved away from her desk in the hall and headed over to his and Noah's office. Once he was out of sight, the elevator arrived back on the floor, and Noah stepped out.

"Oh, Noah, sweetheart, what did that boy do to you?" Cathleen called as Noah stepped forward. "Are you alright?"

"Not now, Cathleen," Noah quietly snarled, his left eye and practically the whole side of his face convulsing sporadically.

"What was that, dear?"

"Not now!" he shouted, heading for the shared office.

The second elevator that was allowed to the top floor arrived and _dinged_ open.

Noah caught the newcomer out of the corner of his eye and whirled on him.

"_What are you doing here?_" he spewed, spittle flying.

Mokuba leaped back, hitting the walls beside the elevator, not used to being spoken to in such a harsh way and not used to be spoken to by Noah at all.

"Noah…" Cathleen barely, whisperingly berated. Seto she had come to view as the adopted bad seed of the family due to a combination of Seto's own attitude and Noah's conniving to be seen as the "good boy." Mokuba, though, while he was the brother to the bad seed, he hadn't done anything on his own to make himself be seen as a bad kid, and Noah had never seen him as being worth badmouthing. He was only Noah's target now because Noah was in a wretched mood that Mokuba's brother had brought about.

"I-I… Mr. Worrshaw was let go this morning, a-and I had nothing else to do, s-s-so I thought I'd visit you guys," Mokuba stuttered out, not having yet moved away from the wall.

Seeing such an_ angry_ look in eyes that were so much like Seto's made Mokuba extremely uneasy, out of place, and scared.

"'You guys'?" Noah sneered. "Bullshit. Just go find your _brother_ and get out of here."

"I-I need to get passed you," Mokuba said, nodding to indicate the open door to the two-person office… the door now occupied by Mokuba's big brother.

"Why don't you back off, Noah," Seto lowly growled.

It was a stand-off. If either Seto or Noah made a move, the other would "attack" them for it. If Mokuba made a move, Noah would "attack" him, and then Seto would attack Noah. Cathleen was just stuck in the middle of all of it… thankfully.

The phone suddenly began to ring, and everyone jumped. With a shaky hand, Cathleen made to answer it, mistakenly putting it on loudspeaker as well.

"Kaiba Corporation, Mr. Kaiba's office," she answered, voice quavering.

"_Cathleen,_" Gozaburo's voice boomed through the speaker. "_You know I don't like to talk over speakerphone. Pick up!_"

"Yes, sir. Right away." Cathleen picked up and began a conversation with her boss, eventually moving to type something into her computer and relay the data back.

The stalemate was broken up with the call and their father's voice coming over the three boys.

Noah was the first to move. Making a disgusted sound in the back of his throat, Noah threw himself away from Mokuba's direction and made his way to the office, pushing brusquely past Seto. As long as Noah wasn't posing a threat to Mokuba, Seto didn't really care.

Making his way over to his little brother, he asked, "Are you okay, Mokuba?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. It was just a little unexpected, you know?" Mokuba twitched his lips in an attempt at a smile.

"It was just a little crazy," Seto countered, checking over his shoulder, not comfortable with his back being so exposed.

"Well, maybe a little…"

Seto knew he had changed when Fu Xi had brought him down beneath his teeth. But, he had never thought that his own head had been affected when it had hit the foyer floor.

But, e had no doubt that something had been messed up in Noah's head. Most of the time he just joked about it (and most of that time it was just to himself), but sometimes he was nothing less than serious about the matter, especially when he felt Mokuba might be a recipient of that… not always so apparent lunacy.

"Come on. Noah needs time to build his ego back up before he sees me again," Seto said as he pressed the down button.

"What did you do to him, Seto?" Mokuba asked, kind of tiredly. If Noah was in a bad mood, Mokuba had found out, it had something to do with Seto. Either he had done well, trumping Noah in some way, or he had somehow been a jerk to Noah, not that Noah didn't usually deserve it.

"I lost the Hiroshi Nauticals deal, and Noah just couldn't leave it alone," Seto told him as they stepped into the elevator.

Mokuba sighed. "And, you just couldn't leave _that_ alone," Mokuba surmised.

"You know me," Seto responded.

Mokuba snorted. "Sometimes it's not as easy as it looks."

They spent several hours after that roaming the Kaiba Corp. building, Seto using the time to get a handle on what each department was up to, as they waited for Gozaburo to make his return.

* * *

"_Send them in, Cathleen_," Gozaburo directed through the intercom.

Noah and Seto were standing out in the hallway, having been waiting for the signal to enter. Mokuba was sitting in their empty office. He hadn't been invited to the meeting between the three oldest Kaibas, but with his tutor already fired, he didn't have much else to do but to wait, in turn, for his brother to come back.

Upon hearing Gozaburo's commandment, both Seto and Noah made their way to the doors without waiting for Cathleen to relay the directive.

The secretary watched the two seventeen-year-olds walk into their father's office. After a moment, she also got up and headed for _their_ office.

"Oh, Mokuba!" she gasped upon catching sight of the boy sitting in his brother's chair, fiddling with a stack of papers he shouldn't have been touching.

"Hello, Cathleen. Is there something you need?" Mokuba politely asked, offering her a small, friendly smile, trying to distract her from his rummaging through Seto's business things.

Cathleen cast a quick glance at the wall that both offices had in common, with its hidden door perfect for spying, but sighed as she admitted in her head to the fact that she couldn't make use of it with Mokuba there.

Collecting herself, Cathleen responded, "Actually, Master Mokuba, there is something I've been instructed to inform you of…"

Next door, a challenge was being issued that would change the dynamics of Kaiba Corporation forever.

"Good of you to come, boys," Gozaburo greeted from where he sat behind his grand desk. In a line behind him, the Big 5 was gathered, and on either side of the door, there was a tall cart covered in cloth.

Seto's eyes narrowed as he took in these details, as well as noticed how three of the Big 5 were having difficulties keeping their faces straight.

_Imbeciles._

"To get straight to it, Noah, Seto, I'm tired."

"What on earth do you mean, father?" Noah questioned while Seto just blinked. Even the Big 5 weren't expecting Gozaburo to say his motivations so plainly, even when they knew what was going on.

"I mean that Kaiba Corporation, and _you two_, have worn me out." Seto couldn't stop a curling smirk from taking over his lips at that, causing Gozaburo to purse his lips and raise a brow at him, only causing Seto to smirk more. "Or, you _almost_ have. I have enough energy left in me for one last bit of sport. Lector. Johnson."

The two men made their way from behind Gozaburo to the cloaked carts by the door. In unison, Lector with the cart nearest to Noah and Johnson with the cart nearest to Seto, the two men whipped the sheets of cloth of the carts and revealed stacks of money on each one.

Seto felt his jaw drop and his eyes widen.

_How much…?_

Crump spoke up from behind Gozaburo. "That is the physical representation of five percent of Kaiba Corp. stocks on each cart. Ten percent in total."

"And," Johnson took over, picking up a piece of paper that lay atop the pile of cash, "this is a contract that binds you in the use of the money you are to be given."

"…What? Neither of you have anything to say? That would be a first," Gozaburo sneered, watching his two sons carefully.

"What will the contract be binding us to?" Noah was the one to ask. Seto was looking at Johnson carefully, his eyes still wide as Johnson had to cover his upturning mouth with a hand.

"In the next year, I expect you to take that money and bring me back one hundred times its original worth. A year should be _more_ than enough time, but it will make it so that, by the end, each of you will be eighteen. That will help to take care of people believing you to be too young for the job, right, Seto?"

The jibe brought Seto back around to face his adoptive father.

"The job?" Noah asked, almost breathlessly. It was so obvious what was coming.

Gozaburo turned his mustard eyes to his biological son. "The job of CEO of Kaiba Corp."

Noah almost bit through his tongue, even though he had known what was coming. Even Seto had to take a great, silent inhalation of breath.

"The first of you to bring me one hundred times the five percent you've been given will become my heir."

* * *

"Hey, so what was that all about?" Mokuba asked when his brother returned.

Seto was about to respond when Noah walked in behind him, and the conversation was paused until Noah left again, carrying several pieces of paper from his desktop with him.

"Pops has issued a challenge," Seto responded vaguely. "What have you been doing?" he asked, needing a little more time to dwell on the subject. "And, who gave you permission to mess with my computer?" he gently scolded.

Mokuba blushed. "Sorry. But, I stopped by Domino High to drop off the forms and stuff for you, and someone who was there set me up with an email account. Another student has already sent me some things. I think I've made a friend." Mokuba chuckled nervously, npot used to the whole 'friend' thing.

"Really?" Seto smiled. Already it was proving to be the right thing to send Mokuba to a real school.

"Yes! Her name is Rebecca Hawkins. She's a bit, um, in-your-face, I guess, even through the emails, but she is the first person to notice and contact me. She's told me where to sit in my classes and stuff like that to prepare me for Monday."

"'Hawkins…' That name sounds familiar," Seto commented, snagging the back of the chair Mokuba was sitting in and bumping the back of it, kindly kicking his brother out of it.

"Yeah, I thought so, too," Mokuba said, standing up, allowing Seto to sit down. "Actually, Rebecca is a duelist. She's America's best, in fact."

"…Oh?" Seto slowly responded.

"Yes, and her grandfather used to own a Blue-Eyes White Dragon. Isn't that cool?" Mokuba continued excitedly. "She said that her grandfather's best friend stole it from him years ago and that it's her goal to get it back from him."

"Hmm," Seto murmured, mildly tapping a finger on his desk's surface.

"…You're sad, aren't you?" Mokuba asked, suddenly taking in his brother's demeanor. "That you were never able to become a duelist, I mean. And, that you never got a Blue-Eyes for yourself."

"Yes… but, I have a plan to change that." Seto made a sudden move, sitting up straight and focusing himself on his computer.

"What are you talking about, Seto?" Mokuba moved up to stand behind Seto as his older brother began rapidly opening various files and browsers.

"Remember how the first thing Pops ever had Noah and I do once we started to work here at KC? The firewall?" Walls of computer code came up, overwhelming the screen.

"Sort of, you and Noah made it impossible for anyone without clearance to get in… right?"

"That's what we were supposed to do, and we did for the most part. But, what Pops really wanted for us to do was to do our best to keep each _other_ out. I was the only one who fully came through in that area."

Mokuba was a bit lost. "Meaning…?"

"Meaning that while Noah and I were working on the firewall, I left some rather obvious backdoors to lull Noah into thinking I wasn't skilled enough to bury anything entries deep enough within the system that he would actually need to search for. The decoys combined with Noah's refusal to accept my intelligence," Seto's lips curled devilishly upward, "made it possible for me to hide several portals within the firewall that I've been using since the moment the firewall was up."

"You could be prosecuted for that, Seto!" Mokuba pointed out, alarmed at the idea of Seto possibly being arrested for hacking into a corporation.

"No one is going to catch me, Mokuba," Seto easily dismissed.

"But, if you _are_ caught—" Mokuba pressed worriedly.

"It will look as if I was authorized to view all the files." Seto turned around and looked Mokuba in the eye. "Mokuba, I'm not an idiot. I know what I'm doing, and I won't get caught."

"I know, Seto," Mokuba mumbled. "But, someone has to look out for you. You don't." Mokuba's concerned gaze turned into an accusatory glare.

Seto winced casually. "My bad."

"I'm serious, Seto! …Watch your back."

"If what I'm planning works, I won't need to watch my back for much longer," Seto confided. He turned back to the computer screen.

"What are you planning?"

"The same thing I've been planning all along: the takedown of Kaiba Corp. At least as a weapons manufacturing company."

The computer code flashed on the screen twice before blanking out and rows upon rows of files, each marked with 'KC' in their title, crowded onto the screen in their place.

"How?" Mokuba asked, watching as Seto skillfully, almost without thinking, made his way and opened a file titled 'KC Contacts.'

Seto pointed at a line of text within the folder, a name. "This is the name of a man who is affiliated with both Kaiba Corp. and Industrial Illusions. He brought Pegasus to the International Armaments Business Conference five years ago. I made brief contact with him, but I've recently been doing my best to establish an actual business relationship with him, using this man," Seto tapped the screen over the name gently, "to do it."

"Why would," Mokuba leaned over closer to the screen, "'Bruce Demebek' want to help you if he knows you want to bring down a business affiliate of his?"

"Demebek provides the technology we put in our weapons, like the tracking and the video imaging, but most of the stuff he is personally interested in doesn't have anything to do with the creation of weapons. His affiliation with anything Kaiba is purely for profit."

"Isn't everyone who has something to do with Kaiba Corp.?" Mokuba asked, thinking that that was the point of a business in any case.

"Haven't you noticed the way Gozaburo talks about his "dynasty" that he "raised" from "birth"? Pops thinks of KC as one of his children more than he thinks of Noah or us as one."

"Yeah, but he's messed up," Mokuba joked.

"Not as messed up as Noah," Seto countered. "_He_ sees the company as more than a business, too."

"…Don't you, too?" Mokuba questioned quietly.

"…I may, but not in the fond way that Gozaburo does, or the fanatical way Noah does. Kaiba Corp. is a symbol of success for me. Once it's mine and is no longer a killing machine, that will mean I've succeeded."

"And, you're going to use Demebek to make it yours."

"Yes, as well as Pegasus and others. I've been waiting to put my plan into place until something like Gozaburo's challenge came along. The main problem I've had have been gathering funds and finding something to tempt others into providing those funds."

"What did you end up finding?" Mokuba asked, not sure if he wanted to know.

Seto navigated out of the 'Contacts' folder and opened up another, nameless folder that appeared blank and began typing. "Remember how I once mentioned that people would like games more if they were more interactive?"

"Yeah, so what?"

Seto finished his typing and suddenly several documents and other filings appeared in a folder that was now titled 'DM-HOLO.' "So," Seto double-clicked something named 'Blue-Eyes holo', "I made it interactive."

He withdrew a key from an inner pocket in his suit jacket. He used it to unlock the bottom drawer of his desk and withdrew what looked like just a plain cell phone and its charger.

"What…?" Mokuba was confused, but then noticed how one end of the charger was actually a USB plug-in.

Seto slid the plug into the port in the computer, and Seto entered a code into the keypad of the phone. The screen lit up and it kept brightening. Again, Seto returned to the computer and hit enter.

Suddenly, a replica of the Blue-Eyes White Dragon took form over the cell phone's screen.

Mokuba gasped. "Oh, my god. Seto, i-it doesn't even look like a hologram. It looks real!"

"I know, and Pegasus wants them for his game."

Mokuba looked at the hologram in wonder, and then looked at his brother. "When did you make this?"

"It's taken several years, and a lot of late nights with the rare spare moment thrown in. I disguised it as a cell phone so that, if someone broke into my desk, they wouldn't know what they were actually looking at. All the technology is from Demebek, which is why he is a good candidate for an investor."

"So, you have, Demebek, Pegasus, and your five percent of KC itself… but is that going to be enough?" Mokuba may not have been as cultivated in the arts of economics as his brothers, but he wasn't clueless. It didn't seem as if Seto had enough built up to buy Gozaburo out.

"They're not enough, no, but that's not all I have, either. Gansley, Johnson, and Nesbitt are also on my side. They don't think Gozaburo is a capable of running Kaiba Corp. any longer, no matter what it builds, and they've never thought much of Noah. They know that if they stay with me, I'll not only increase profits, but increase their standings within the company, and therefore the world."

"You got them to betray Gozaburo," Mokuba muttered.

"They would have betrayed him anyway, Mokuba. I just gave them a way to do it in a way where they didn't feel as guilty seeing as I am also a Kaiba," Seto pointed out, showing no remorse.

Mokuba grunted in understanding. "What about Crump and Lector? Why aren't they included with the rest of the Big 5?"

"They aren't necessary," Seto responded. "Crump is a fool who's obsessed with penguins. Lector _might_ be needed, though, if I can get him to turn on Gozaburo." Seto's brow creased in thought and he tapped his finger against his hologram-producing cell phone, causing the image of the dragon to jump. "We're just short of our goal of gaining fifty-one percent of the company, and even after that, we will need more than the others have in order to keep our hold over the company, and then I'll still eventually have to pay them all back so that our control would be absolute."

"'Our'?" Mokuba asked.

Seto's cobalt eyes jumped to Mokuba's lavenders. "Of course. You're my brother, and this is going to be our company, Mokie."

The brothers just looked at each other for a moment before Mokuba took a deep breath.

"If… if this is going to be our company, then I want to help make it ours. Cathleen told me earlier, before you got here, that I've been given a two percent share of Kaiba Corp., to sort of make up for you and Noah each being given five percent. You can have my share if it'll help you with your takeover."

Seto took his own deep breath. "Yes, Mokuba, that will help tremendously. Thank you. Kaiba Corporation is going down, and you and I are going to be the ones to do it."

* * *

"You wished to see me, Master Noah?" Crump asked as he ducked his head into the seventh story boardroom.

"Yes, Crump. Come in," Noah beckoned, seated at the head of the long table in the ill-lit room, his white suit being the only bright thing in the room.

"Excuse my hesitance, sir," Crump said as he semi-waddled into the room, "but shouldn't your father—"

"No, Gozaburo should _not_ be here, if that was what you were about to say," Noah quickly interrupted, eye twitching slightly.

"Again, excuse me, but, sir, I believe your father would want to know—"

"_Gozaburo_ has lost his hold on this company, Crump. He's given the orphan and I little pieces of the company to see how we can handle it. It's all a rather obvious ploy to see which of us is better suited to running Kaiba Corp."

"What exactly does this have to do with me… uh, sir?" Crump questioned. Numbers were his things, not… schemes. That was why he was a member of the Big 5: the others took care of these sorts of things. Not him, not Crump. Noah knew this.

"Crump, you are Kaiba Corporation's financial advisor… you have access to Kaiba Corp.'s accounts."

"Well, yes," Crump mumbled, flustered.

"Five percent of Kaiba Corporation is not enough. I want more. I _need_ more in order to take out— I mean, to show Gozaburo that I'm capable of running this company. Do you understand?" Noah bit down on his lower lip.

"Sir, I am absolutely loyal to Mr. Kaiba," Crump hurried to assert himself.

"This isn't a test of loyalty, Crump! It's a chance to better yourself within this company," Noah spat. He ran a frustrated hand through his teal hair. "_If_ you choose to help me get the funds I need, you will become my vice president," Noah said, trying to gather an air of calmness to cover up for his slip in temper.

"I don't know what to say, sir… A-are you sure this isn't a test, sir?" Crump fumbled out.

"Yes, Crump," Noah ground out. "And—" Noah couldn't believe he was doing this "—to sweeten the deal, I know you have a fascination in regards to… _penguins_."

Crump's eyes lit up. "Why, yes, sir. Yes, I do."

"Hm. If you help me with my little plan, I will help _you_ to… I don't know, build a refuge to save flipper-less penguins or something." Noah shook his head, just not getting it. _Seriously, penguins?_

"No," Crump immediately responded, decisive for the first time since he came into the room. "I want a park built, an amusement park centered around penguins, so that others will be inspired to love the animals as much as I do."

Noah's eyes widened and his glasses almost slipped off his nose. _An amusement park?_

"Done, yes, of course. What a wonderful idea!" Noah hurried to reassure.

Crump was practically salivating until reality set in again.

"What exactly are you going to use the money for, Master Noah? How is it going to show your father that you're better for the job than Master Seto?"

Noah felt his lips pulling back from his teeth and gums in a snarl and did his best to quell his rising anger. The very fact that Gozaburo _had_ made it a competition was insulting enough, but to have people validating the old man's concern made it so much worse.

Noah cleared his throat, putting his fist before his mouth, and closed his eyes tightly for a moment. "Gozaburo has given the orphan and I a year to bring back one hundred times the amount of the five percent we each have been "given"." Noah made brief air-quotes in demonstration. "If I have more money to invest with, I will be able to gain more, and do it faster and in a less difficult manner than Seto, showing Gozaburo who is better suited to the job."

_Seto can NOT be allowed to take over this company… And, Gozaburo shouldn't be the one allowed to decide who getts Kaiba Corp. _

Crump's pudgy eyes narrowed uncertainly. "Forgive me for saying this, sir, but why should I help you? Why shouldn't I go to Master Seto with your idea and help him—?"

"You know what Seto would think of your idea of a penguin amusement park? He would laugh, Crump. He would laugh in your face. I am the only chance of your dream coming true, the _only_ chance. Do you understand? You would be gone in a second should Seto seize control of this company."

"I… I understand, sir," Crump said, his eyes cast downward.

"Good. How soon can you get me the money?" Noah dove to the point.

"I need the pass codes before I can get to anything. After that, I can move however much you want of Gozaburo's assets into an account of your choosing," Crump said, getting into accountant mode. "Whatever is under Gozaburo's name will then be under yours. Technically, you'd be in control of the company as long as you had the majority of the stocks, which Gozaburo does."

"Perfect," Noah whispered.

_See, Father?_ _I'm doing exactly what you wanted for me to do. Do you see?_

**Thanks for reading! I am personally not a techie type, so if any of the talk about firewalls and backdoors doesn't make sense that would be why. Also, while I know that it's consistent in both English and Japanese versions of the anime that Mokuba got two percent of KC, what Seto was given varies between him also being given two percent and being given ten million dollars. I just decided to have Seto and Noah have five percent each because I didn't see ten million each as being enough and I didn't think that Mokuba would be given an equal share with his brothers. **

**This fic may end up being a couple chapters shorter than I originally planned because of all the time I lost over this past month. And, I don't have a concrete time set for the next update because of everything being a month behind schedule. Everything, though, has to be completed by the beginning of April for my project to be valid, so it will all be finished up before then.**


	7. The Race

**As you all probably are aware of by now, this fanfic is counting as a graduation requirement for my high school. As part of the presentation, it's been suggested that I read aloud certain sections of this story so that the evaluators can experience for themselves what I've been doing for the past several months. So, if any of you would mind telling me in a review or PM-ing me what your favorite scenes have been so far, or just a particular combination of words you may have liked, I would greatly appreciate your helping me in this area. **

**Chapter Seven: The Race**

Seto had a flair for flaunting things in people's faces without them knowing it, Mokuba had to admit.

They were in the seventh story boardroom of Kaiba Corp., the one that Noah himself had been using just weeks previous.

Seto and Mokuba were seated side by side at the head of the table, a laptop set up in front of them. Along one side of the table sat Pegasus, lips curling in a smirk, and Bruce Demebek, a dark, broad man who didn't talk much. And, on the other side, sat Gansley, tapping his finger against his lower lip, Nesbitt, nervously tugging at his collar and checking his watch, and Johnson, smiling serenely, if dangerously. All the power players of Seto's takeover were in one room, right under Gozaburo's nose.

If anyone from the company with half a brain were to stick their nose in, all of them would be discovered and turned in, and the whole takeover might crash down around them. But, only Mokuba and Nesbitt seemed to be concerned that that would happen, and Mokuba was the least of the two. And, Mokuba had to admit that it felt good to not be the weakest for once, even if he was still the smallest.

Actually, looking around the room and ignoring himself, Mokuba had to say that, even with Seto only being seventeen, it looked as if the room was filled with fully adult men, here to do some serious business. And, looking up at his brother, Mokuba actually felt kind of proud of how he was able to sit suavely and not be intimidated by the older, more experienced, and, theoretically, more authoritative men around him, waiting for him to make the first move.

"There is really only one reason I called this meeting," Seto suddenly started, catching some of the people present off-guard at his sudden address. "Our operatives in the Big 5 say they have some urgent news that they need to communicate to us. Gentlemen." Seto extended a hand in the three's direction, and Mokuba couldn't help but notice as the tail of a scar peeked out beneath Seto's cuff.

"Yes. Crump has been recruited by Noah," Johnson laid out bluntly, causing both Nesbitt and Gansley to flinch a little. "He's been trying to recruit the rest of us, besides Lector, to Noah's side."

Gansley took over, quick speech giving away his own anxiety, "He doesn't seem to like dealing with the boy on his own and wants the rest of us to come have his back. He constantly badgers us with the fact that their plan is supposedly failsafe."

Johnson took over again, "According to him Noah was somehow able to get his hands on the pass codes to Gozaburo's accounts. We don't know how he got them—"

"Cathleen," Seto said, lips twisting wryly. "He hates her, but is constantly hanging around the old—" Mokuba stomped on Seto's foot beneath the table, stopping him from finishing the sentence, and glaring up at him. Mokuba liked the secretary, if just a little bit. The rest of the meeting members watched with various degrees of fascination as the two shared a look.

"…Anyway," Seto continued, "Cathleen's is one of two computers that can access that sort of information, the other being Gozaburo's. He would have gotten the codes from her, or perhaps just straight from her computer with her having no idea as to what was going on."

"Sneaky little Kaiba," Pegasus clucked, amused.

"Those pass codes change every so many days, so Noah will have had to have been getting into the system with each change." Seto pulled the laptop to him and began logging into the KC network using hi series of backdoors.

For several minutes, Seto just typed, ignoring those around him, watching him in curiosity. The three members of the Big 5 watched with varying degrees of uncertainty, Nesbitt being the only one of them to really understand all that could be done with computers, but him already starting out as the nervous one. Pegasus smiled with a lazy sort of craftiness hidden in the expression. Demebek didn't seem to be looking at anything, but would occasionally nod, as if he understood what Seto was typing. And, Mokuba just watched all of these people doing their various things, as Seto did _his_ thing.

"There," Seto said, finishing whatever he'd been up to. "The new pass code is supposed to be up today. I can't change what it is, but I can change what's displayed on Cathleen's computer. Noah got a late start this morning, so he shouldn't have seen it yet."

Johnson nodded and straightened his glasses. "That problem is taken care of, but Crump, rather obviously, isn't the most subtle of people. If the schedule is hurried up, we're worried that Mr. Kaiba will discover our plan."

"I'm concerned about that, too," Seto said. "That's why—"

"Pardon the interruption, good sirs," Pegasus barged into the conversation, having become suddenly suspicious to the real motivations behind this meeting, "but if this is _another_ attempt to wring more funding out of Demebek and I to buy stocks, I don't see why you bothered to bring us all together today. We can't afford to furnish you with any more than we've already given, even if the amount is so small at this point thanks to your daddy's gift." Pegasus directed the tail of the statement at Seto. Demebek had nodded along as Pegasus had spoken.

Seto lips twitched slightly. "You've made yours and Demebek's positions clear, Pegasus. But, thanks to my little brother, we no longer have any need to gain financial support."

"Really? So, the itsiest bitsiest Kaiba came through? How cute," Pegasus declared, sarcasm twinkling in his one visible, sienna-colored eye, causing shudders to go through Mokuba when the eye was turned on him.

"So, what do we do for now?" Nesbitt asked, his fraying nerves showing through the trembling in his voice.

"We move the plan forward," Seto answered quickly, seeming to have already prepared his response. "Forget about stealth; it's not needed anymore. We buy up the remaining stocks we need immediately, before anyone can realize what we're doing and put a stop to it."

"And, what about Noah?" Johnson queried, seeming to be the only one of the present Big 5 not concerned or guilty about what was soon to go down. "We have no idea how far along he is, and if he has Crump on his side, the accounts must be involved somehow."

"Leave Noah to me," Seto answered, entering something into the laptop. "I can easily figure out what he's up to, and I'll direct you all on how to react after I do. Understood?"

"Yes, Mr. Kaiba," the room answered, even Mokuba and Pegasus.

_Mr. Kaiba…_ Seto thought, a slight smile gracing his lips. _If that doesn't say everything right there._

* * *

It was late afternoon when Noah was finally able to slink behind Cathleen's desk to access her computer. He didn't know where she'd gone or how long she'd be, but he'd become so adept at finding the pass codes and sending them to Crump that he didn't need more than a few minutes.

_As usual_, Noah thought. He quickly opened up the untraceable email account he'd made expressly for this purpose, and copied and pasted the newest code into the message, and sent it to the equally untraceable account he'd made for Crump.

Noah felt himself actually smiling as he pulled off and cleaned his gold-framed glasses. _For once_ in the longest time, things were going right in his life. Soon he'd have Kaiba Corporation under his control, his father would see that _he_ was the better son, and Seto and Mokuba would finally be sent away.

Putting the glasses back on, he felt his lips spread even tighter across his face and a laugh burbled up from inside him.

It was all going so _right_. Noah kept laughing as he sent the chair spinning. So _right._

The chair began to wobble, and Noah threw out his hands to catch his balance. One of his hands skittered across the keyboard of Cathleen's computer, and something came up, a file with no name on it.

Feeling giddily curious, Noah thought, _Why the hell not_, and decided to access the file.

A list of names appeared:

M. Pegasus.

_Pegasus? What is that crackpot doing in a Kaiba Corp. file? I thought he made games,_ Pegasus scoffed.

B. Demebek.

_Demebek? Only Lector deals with Demebek, and _his_ files aren't on the general system._

Johnson, Gansley, Nesbitt…

_What the…? Members of the Big 5?_

M. Kaiba.

…

S. Kaiba.

…

Looking over the list again, Noah saw that beside each name was a percentage; ten percent, six percent, seven percent, seven percent, seven percent, two percent, five percent.

_Five percent. Gozaburo gave each of us five percent of the company from his own holdings…_

Oh, God.

Noah instantly called up the stock portfolio for Kaiba Corporation.

Oh, _God._

The stocks were… disappearing. Someone was snatching them up right in front of Noah's nose. And, Seto only needed six more percent of the company…

Noah sprang from Cathleen's chair and hurried to his office. Things felt like they were breaking all around him, shattering and crumbling all before they'd even been fully formed.

Seto was in the office, talking on the landline that they'd each been provided with while twirling a cell phone that Noah had never seen in his free hand. The bottom drawer, the one Noah had never been able to get into while Seto was away, was wide open, as if it had never been shut.

Noah took a deep, shaking breath, refusing to allow Seto to see how shaken and disturbed he was.

_How am I supposed to act cool when he's _right there? _He's going to take everything from me, and _he_ can act as if everything was normal, but I know I can't. I can't—_ the voice in Noah's mind continued yammering, but he was able to somewhat calmly make his way over to his desk, only a palsy-like tremor and overly wide eyes giving away his distress.

Seto pretended not to notice him as the teal-haired boy walked over, stumbling once, to sit opposite him. He just continued mildly talking to the men on the other end of the line, making sure not to use Demebek's or Pegasus's name as they spoke to him over speakerphone. He'd already contacted the Big 3, as Mokuba had christened them after the meeting that morning, giving them the final details as to how the plan was to proceed.

Noah took another moment to breathe and try to get that insecure voice in his head to _shut up_ before looking around his desk for… something. Why had he even come in here?

Oh, it was for…

Noah's eyes began darting all over his desk, noticing that something was off. His files were straightened. He'd brought them in with him this morning from home and had just tossed them onto his desktop, letting papers slid out of them, thinking he would organize them later.

Now, they were in a neat pile, all their innards fit tightly back inside their correct folder, and Noah hadn't been the one to do it.

Noah slowly raised his eyes and met Seto's eyes looking back at him. They were silent, Seto ignoring the voices coming through the receiver still held to his ear.

"Y—" Noah choked out. Seto didn't respond. They just stared.

_This isn't just about my going through his things_, Seto thought. He felt his lips tighten as he realized, _he knows_.

It was only fitting, Seto reluctantly supposed, that Noah would learn of Seto's scheming as Seto learned of the details of Noah's plan.

So, the two sat across from each other, each realizing the extent to which the other knew.

For several eternity-long moments, nothing happened…

Then, startling Seto, Noah pushed himself away from his desk and ran out of the room.

Seto felt his lips part in surprise at the drastic exit, but it didn't take long for him to become aware of the yelling in his ear.

"_Kaiba-boy, if you don't answer this minute—!"_ Pegasus was ranting.

"I'm here," Seto interjected, clearing his throat. "Noah came in—"

"_Oh, that would explain it,"_ Pegasus said, overwhelmingly understanding. _"Speaking of Noah, what do we do?"_

"Exactly as before, only faster," Seto answered, looking down at the pseudo-cell phone in his hand.

"_You've already told us to act immediately,"_ Demebek put in, his bear-like voice even gruffer than usual. Sometimes Seto was surprised that this man was into technology rather than hunting and camping, or something of the like. _"How do you expect us to go any faster?"_

"Noah may have stumbled onto our plan somehow," Seto confessed. _That look in his eyes…_

"_Did you slip up, Kaiba-boy?"_ Pegasus asked mockingly.

"I don't know, but we can be sure he's not waiting around to make wisecracks. We need to move everything up even more now."

The urgency was beginning to dawn in all their minds. If Noah was able to get the stocks first…

"_We'll contact those other three,"_ Demebek volunteered, taking control of the situation. _"You need to do whatever you can to stall Noah and Crump. We'll contact you—"_

"Contact Mokuba. Noah might do something stupid like going to Pops, and then I'll be under watch. No one's going to suspect Mokuba."

"_That little Kaiba keeps on proving his usefulness, doesn't he?" _Pegasus mused. _"By the way, Kaiba-boy, are you really sure that you're going to be okay betraying your "Pops"?"_

"…Yes, I'm sure." Seto hung up the phone and turned to his computer.

* * *

"Crump! How close are we?" Noah almost shouted, rounding the corner into the doorway of Crump's office, located on the thirteenth floor, the accounting floor.

"Noah, uh, sir! Well, there have been some setbacks…" Crump mumbled into his moustache, shrinking into his seat.

"What sort of setbacks?" Noah quickly asked, wild, wide eyes scaring Crump.

"Well, someone else has been buying up Kaiba Corp. stock—"

"_I know that!_" Noah shrieked, making Crump flinch and begin fiddling with his cufflinks. "And, I know who's buying them. Why aren't we buying them up faster? We have the funds!"

"W-we d-did, sir, but I've recently been locked out of the Gozaburo's accounts," Crump sputtered out.

"…What?"

"Th-the last pass code you sent me was wrong; they blocked me from accessing your father's shares…"

_The pass codes were wrong?_

Then, they knew about that part of the scheme too. They knew everything, from Cathleen's computer to Crump's involvement in the accounts.

"Maybe, sir, we could try again—"

"No. They know I've been using the secretary's computer—"

"Then, you could sneak into your father's—"

"No, you idiot!" Before Noah knew it, his hand was flying and slapping across Crump's fat face, leaving a bright red imprint and creating a sharp _cracking_ sound. The surprised member of the Big 5 actually fell down from the blow, crashing into his desk as he went down.

Lector was in there with Gozaburo, and they'd be there for the rest of the day, installing some sort of upgrade to Gozaburo's computer. There was no way to get that access code. Here was nothing he could do… nothing.

Noah had to go. He had to go right now.

He left Crump to roll around behind the desk, running through the halls of the thirteenth floor. He needed to hide, he needed to get away. He barged into the men's room, praying that no one was in there with him.

He locked the door behind him and, on impulse, turned off all the lights. Noah took a few unsteady steps into the blackness before falling to his hands and knees on the darkened floor. Tearing off his glasses, he threw them across the room.

His hard breathing from the running turned into vicious pants.

_Oh, my god. What am I going to do?_

Noah let out a wail as his head sank down to the floor.

He'd worked so hard to make Kaiba Corp. _his_. He'd worked so hard to make his father _proud_.

And, Seto was stealing it all away, right in front of his nose!

_That orphan bastard!_

Noah let out another howl. But, he couldn't think anymore, he could barely feel the cold tile against his forehead and palms.

It was all _gone_…

"It's not _gone_. It's just inaccessible."

Noah snapped up so fast he ended up falling over in the opposite direction, falling on his ass.

"Who's there?" he called out.

A laugh came out of nowhere.

"Just think, Noah. It's inaccessible, but not gone. And, anything that's inaccessible can become _accessible_. It's just waiting to."

"But… but, how?" _Who was this person, feeding me the way out?_

"Only _you_ have something Seto doesn't have," the voice continued.

"Seto has everything!" Noah screamed. Wheeling around, he scrambled to the light switch, and flicked it on. Turning back around, Noah saw… no one. Nothing. He was alone.

But, suddenly Noah saw movement out of the corner of his eye, and he spun, swinging his fist as he went. It crashed into the closest mirror, cracking it, causing the shards to dig into and between his knuckles. It was just his own reflection that he'd seen.

Pulling his hand back, splinters of mirror came with it, sticking out, and blood began streaming down and over his now ruined hand. Now not only his legs would be scarred, but his hand too. All that blood…

"Yes. All that _blood_. Do you see, now?" the voice asked, sounding nowhere but in Noah's own head.

Blood. Noah's blood. Noah's blood was Gozaburo's blood.

"You're still his son," the voice whispered. "You're still entitled to what this blood ties you to."

Entitlement.

_Gozaburo's will._

"Seto hasn't been put into it yet," Noah murmured.

"No, he hasn't," the voice agreed. "If Gozaburo dies, you get everything that was once _inaccessible_."

Noah gasped. _Of course._

A giggle suddenly burst out of Noah, and it continued, turning into a raging, all-out laugh. _Of course._

When Noah gained a semblance of control of himself, he examined his reflection…

His pupils looked to be shaking madly within the iris.

_Madly._ The word made Noah want to giggle again. But, he had to retain control… for now.

He retrieved his glasses before he left the bathroom. The frame had become bent, and when he put them on, they listed off to one side, and a thin hairline crack ran through the left lens.

He got looks as he left the thirteenth and walked through the hallways, back to the top floor, most of them focused on his skewed glasses, some on his paper towel-covered hand. Noah ignored them all.

Gozaburo looked up as someone entered his office, his assistant Lector continuing to make the upgrades to his boss's computer.

"Noah, why do you disturb me?" Gozaburo barked, an unfounded dark mood coming upon him. "And, what in God's name happened to your glasses?"

Noah turned his back to his father, still standing in the open door. With his face turned away, Noah spoke with a calm, measured voice.

"Father, can we… _talk?_"

* * *

Back at the house, Seto was indulging himself in what he would never admit to being a nervous habit. He was flicking through his Duel Monsters cards, the ones he had left from when he was a child.

In just a few hours, Seto's plan would be complete, and then he and Mokuba would be the majority shareholders of Kaiba Corporation. The manufacturing of weapons would stop immediately once that happened, and a new era would begin for the company, one that didn't involve the destruction of lives, but rather the bettering of them through enjoyable pastimes. Soon, Mokuba would be getting the phone call that everything was over and done with.

But, Seto still felt uneasy about something. Had he left some option open for Noah to use? For him to be able to take Kaiba Corp. for his in the end?

No. Every feasible, legal option was blocked. And, if Noah tried something illegal, or more illegal than he'd already done, Seto would be the first to call him on it and turn him in.

Seto smirked to himself. They had to face it: Noah and he had never really bonded as brothers, or as anything, really. Even considering the other as being something respectable as a rival didn't settle well with their definitions of each other.

Noah was a spoiled, snarky, whiny weakling, and Seto was an intrusive, arrogant, daddy-stealing orphan.

Seto would probably have to do something about that once he was the CEO of Kaiba Corp. The Kaiba Estate was attached to the Corporation, so once he had his stocks, he would own the house. But, he was considering allowing Gozaburo and Noah to continue living there, while, once Seto was eighteen, he and Mokuba would move out. It wasn't as if the place was full of fond memories, and Seto, though he might enjoy it for a time, didn't care for the label of being a sore winner that he would incur immediately upon throwing the two out.

_Anyway, Pops hasn't been that bad… to me._

Mokuba he still just ignored, and Noah… well Seto hated Noah, so it didn't really matter how Gozaburo treated the brat. But, between Gozaburo and Seto there had been a sort of respect reached in the past several years that had at least kept them from ripping into each other like Seto and Noah did on occasion.

Seto sighed. Pops probably would either be proud of him for his cunning scheme, or hate his guts for using the gift of his own personal stock to take him down. Either way, Seto had to do this.

_Sorry, Pops._

Seto slammed his cards down and left his room. The ill-at-ease sensation was still with him, and it didn't seem as if it was going to be leaving him soon.

He decided to walk it off, waking deep into the house until he reached the windows showing off the empty inner courtyard. Seto had never been in the courtyard itself, even after the dogs had been taken away. He found himself rubbing his scarred shoulder unconsciously. He was more unnerved than he'd thought.

_I wished they'd just call already._

Because, that had to be the cause of his fidgeting uneasiness. Once Kaiba Corp. was secured in his hands, he'd be calm again.

Acting on a whim, Seto decided to enter the courtyard. He hurried down one of the staircases into the foyer, then, turned around immediately to duck under the overhanging balcony to the glass doors of the courtyard. The unused door handle took some shimmying to get it to open, almost causing Seto to believe the area had been locked off, but the catch finally released with a _snick_, popping open.

It was fully night now, and the moon was just becoming visible in the courtyard. There were no windows on the lower level around the space besides the doors, and the windows on the second level only glowed with light; one couldn't see what was actually in the lighted rooms and hallways.

It was like a prison yard. _No wonder Fu Xi and Nu Wa were so savage._

Seto shivered, still massaging his shoulder.

"Are you alright, sir?" a voice asked behind him, causing Seto to turn around. Anna stood in the entryway to the courtyard.

He took a deep breath. "Yes, I'm fine. Anna, have you seen Noah?" Seto asked the first servant he had ever met within the Kaiba household.

"No, Master Seto. He didn't come home with you?" Anna questioned, brow furrowing.

"No… Has Pops arrived, yet?" The uncomfortable feeling in Seto's stomach was getting worse the longer the two Kaibas besides himself and Mokuba were absent.

"No, Mr. Kaiba hasn't come home either. Is something the matter?"

"I hope not…"

Somewhere back in the Westward Wing of the house, a phone rang.

* * *

Looping a video feed hadn't been had for Noah, not in the least. He'd used _Seto's_ backdoor into the system to do it, making it seem as if there was nothing on the roof, just as there hadn't been only a few minutes ago.

"Is there a reason you picked the roof, boy?" Gozaburo asked sarcastically, as if he'd expected Noah to choose somewhere unfit for them to _chat_.

"I just wanted the privacy is all," Noah responded quietly.

"Puh, privacy," Gozaburo scoffed. "I doubt that whatever you have to say warrants this degree of secrecy, Noah." He walked over to the edge of the building and peered over the rim, Noah following closely behind.

"Father," Noah began, causing Gozaburo to turn and look at him. "You always tell me no when I ask you for this, but you have to say yes this time. You _have to_."

Gozaburo's eyes and nostrils both flared as he lifted his nose into the air. "I don't have to do anything, Noah. So, either ask it and be prepared for me to say 'no,' or get out of my way so that I can go home."

Noah winced, but didn't back down. "Please, send the orphans away. Send them back."

"Are you an idiot, Noah!" Gozaburo roared, not believing his ears.

He made to storm past his son back into the building, but Noah got in his way, blocking him, causing him to take a step back, nearer the edge.

"What is the matter with you, boy?" Gozaburo demanded to know, outraged. "Seto's staying, and—"

"Seto's about to rip the company right out from under you, Father. He's doing it right now! _As we speak_, Father!"

That gave Gozaburo a moment's pause, and Noah thought he actually had a chance. "Father, if you give the rest of your personal shares of the company to me, I can get the company before he does. We can make it _our_ company."

Gozaburo's wretchedly yellow eyes shifted down to look at his son. "…Why would I do that?"

"'W-why?' To keep Seto from getting Kaiba Corp—!"

"Seto isn't _getting_ Kaiba Corp. Seto is _earning_ Kaiba Corp. He is working for it, bit by bit. You'd be the one who'd be getting it if I were to just hand over my stock to you."

"But, he's using Demebek, he's using members of the Big 5—"

"Then, good for him!" Gozaburo triumphed.

"I… I've been doing the same thing, Father—"

"Then, you must be failing. Why else would you be here and Seto not? Christ, Noah—"

"Do you love me, Father?" Noah finally was able to spit out the question that had been gnawing at him since Seto and Mokuba had first stepped out of the car five years ago. Did his father love him… or not?

"…That's a ridiculous question, Noah," Gozaburo finally replied, seeming flustered. For the first time in Noah's life, Gozaburo was the first one to look away.

Noah began to breathe, shuddering, the ugly thing that had risen within him in the bathroom taking over again.

"…If you don't love me, do you love _Seto?_" Noah spat, his eyes wide, pupils dilated.

"That… is none of your business, Noah." Gozaburo tried to move around Noah again, but was stopped by his son's hand on his chest.

"My father doesn't love me, but he loves an orphan. A filthy, _disgusting_ orphan." Noah wasn't talking to Gozaburo anymore. Noah wasn't _here_ anymore.

"Noah…?" Gozaburo questioned, feeling nervous for once in the face of Noah, or whatever this person… _thing_ was.

Noah's hand fisted into the cloth of Gozaburo's suit. "How can he not love me? After I've done everything he's asked?"

"Now, Noah. Calm down," Gozaburo tried to sooth, flashbacks as to what life with Noah's mother had been like. "Noah—"

"Why can't you love me?" Noah slapped his second hand onto Gozaburo's chest… and pushed.

Pushed Gozaburo, his father, over the edge of the building.

**Thank you for reading!**

**There's only one chapter left, a final wrap-up to the story, and it should be posted really soon. I hope to see you there for the final conclusion of ****The Kaiba Heir****, and please let me know of any parts that you feel should be read aloud at my presentation. Thanks again! **


	8. Relating to Insanity

**Welcome to the final chapter of ****The Kaiba Heir****! Thank you to everyone who stuck with this story since the beginning, especially those who reviewed and contributed to the making of this story.**

**And, again, please let me know of any scenes that you feel should be read aloud at my presentation. I would hugely appreciate any input you could give on this front.**

**Chapter Eight: Relating to Insanity**

Noah, a giant deforming smile upon his thin lips, practically skipped down the staircase, into the foyer.

Today was such a _good_ day.

He squinted as one of the servants came into view. As he'd pushed his father off the roof— Noah chuckled quietly at the thought— the old man had reached out, trying to catch himself on anything that might stop his fall into the abyss. But, all he'd managed to snag was the glasses from Noah's face and leave a few bloody trails across Noah's cheek with his scrabbling fingernails.

But, Noah could get new glasses, and the wounds would heal. The wounds would finally heal…

"Anna!" Noah called out jubilantly. The maid flinched to a stop on her way across the foyer, turning to look at the young master with a look of fear on her face.

Fear? No, it couldn't be fear. Noah just really needed his glasses.

Anna had been one of his loyal servants when he'd been the only son of Gozaburo Kaiba, but Noah remembered watching her become more and more distant once _they_ had arrived. _Just one more thing _they_ took away from me._

"Y-yes, Noah?" she asked.

"Where are my dear _brothers_?" The eviction couldn't wait. Noah had compulsively checked his father's will ever since Seto had come to the house, but Gozaburo had never once changed it in all those years, even after he had come to _love_ Seto. Everything still came to Noah… like Gozaburo's Kaiba Corp. stocks.

A twisted smile began curling Noah's lips. Kaiba Corporation was _his_.

Anna had taken a step back as the menacing grin had taken residence on Noah's face, but she still answered him.

"A phone call came in last night, before you arrived home. Masters Seto and Mokuba immediately left to see to it, whatever it was."

_They vacated on their own? Unlikely._

"Hm. Thank you, Anna. Please call a car around. I'm going to Kaiba Corp."

"Y-yes, sir, right away." Anna left quickly, leaving Noah to gloat in the foyer.

The car arrived and took Noah straight to the building at the center of Domino. A crowd was gathered around the base of the tower and several police cars were parked on the sidewalk, blue and red lights flashing and whirling. Miles of yellow police line seemed to be strung out around a specific area.

_I wonder what could have happened,_ Noah wondered to himself, sparking another freakish giggling fit, causing the driver of the car to look nervously back at him.

"Um, sir?"

"Mm, _yes?_" Noah asked slimily.

"It doesn't look as if we'll be able to drive up front. Would it be all right if we went around the back?"

"Yes, that sounds all right. Everything is _perfectly_ all right."

"Uh, yes, sir." The driver seemed to take the next corner a little too fast, and when the driver came around to open the door for Noah, he wouldn't even look in his direction and kept shifting his weight between his two feet.

_Something's odd with the servants,_ Noah noted. Perhaps he would replace the entire staff once he officially became lord of the manor.

No, most of the servants had been with the family since before the orphans came along. They were relics of a happier time and should be kept.

Noah walked in through the back entrance of Kaiba Corp. and headed for the lobby. Employees were milling about everywhere, clumping together in to chatter in low tones. The occasional person was crying and being comforted by those around them. Noah had never really thought about it, but it sort of made sense to him that the people at lower levels within the company would make friends, or at the very least like each other's company. Still, it seemed odd to him.

Everyone stopped speaking when Noah came into view. For a few moments, all that could be heard was the occasional sniff and swish of fabric. They all stared at Noah, and Noah stared back, or did his best to without his glasses.

Karen, _Seto's_ little helper, was the one to finally make a move and come up to him, turning away from a blonde woman who'd been sobbing her eyes out a moment ago, but was now looking at Noah with an almost horrified expression. Again, not that Noah could actually tell for sure without his glasses.

"Sir," Karen said, "I've been asked to take you directly upstairs upon arrival." She sounded very brisk, efficient, but also somewhat removed, dead.

_She couldn't possibly be mourning Gozaburo,_ Noah thought suspiciously. _She's been on Seto's side from the beginning. She may even been part of Seto's attempted takeover. She probably hated my father._

"Lead the way, Karen. After all, how on _earth_ am I expected to navigate my way through _my_ building all the way up to _my_ office without your help?" Several people around them flinched and stepped backward at the whiny sarcasm in his voice.

Karen just blinked and headed for the elevators, leaving Noah to follow at his leisure, which he eventually did, pausing to give the large a gathering a second look and sneering the whole way.

The elevators opened to show a large man already inside them. He was in a suit, but it was of such pathetic quality that Noah knew the man didn't work for Kaiba Corp. Noah glared as he stepped in, but the man didn't even seem to notice. Karen had moved to stand quite near the man, almost cowering in his shadow, but not away from him, more away from Noah.

_Huh._

Karen had already pressed the button for the top floor, but no other levels were lit up. Apparently the stranger was coming with them.

The elevator doors slid open with a chime, but Karen and the man made no moves to leave, merely gesturing for Noah to proceed. Noah regarded her coldly, squinting to bring her face into focus. He was horribly near-sighted.

"Aren't you coming?"

"I wasn't asked to come along, just to deliver you," the young woman carefully responded.

Noah frowned at her. "Right…"

But, he left it at that. Maybe the girl deserved a break. She'd be gone soon enough once Noah officially took control of the company.

A wretched noise bombarded Noah the moment he stepped out of the elevator. A wailing, sobbing sound, worse than that of all the people in the lobby combined. Noah walked a ways down the halls before he found the source of the noise: Cathleen, the secretary. She was in what _used_ to be Noah's office, the one he'd been forced to share with Seto. The older woman was sitting behind Noah's desk, Seto's chair having vanished, crying loudly with a glob of messy, drippy tissues growing in front of her.

Another, not as large, man was standing near her, keeping… guard?

Cathleen looked up and saw Noah in the door. "_Oh, Noah!_" she screeched, making to get up and come to him. But, the man stopped her with a hand on her shoulder pushing her gently, kindly back into the seat.

"Cathleen? What's going on?" Noah asked, pretending to be ignorant. He'd always been good at that, especially when it came to Cathleen and the tutors he'd had as a child. He didn't see the man with his hand on Cathleen's shoulder narrow his eyes at Noah's words.

"Oh, it's horrible, Noah!" She was caught up in another surge of blubbering. "Your father's—"

"Ma'am," the man quickly interrupted. "Perhaps he shouldn't be told without having it broken to him gently? Let my colleagues handle this."

"Oh, yes. Yes, you're right! Poor Noah!" That started Cathleen up all over again. "And, those other boys, too! This is the second time it's happened to those ones, you know," Cathleen informed the man between gasping hiccups.

Noah's eyes widened a little upon hearing that. He'd always known, but it hadn't really sunk in that Seto's and Mokuba's parents had had to die before they could have become orphans. Now, all three of them were orphans because of Gozaburo's death…

Good. Now those brats were officially what they had been all along: _orphans_.

Noah had to bite his bottom lip to keep from grinning.

"Mr. Kaiba," the man said, catching his attention. "My colleagues and others are waiting for you in the next office over." He jerked his head toward the wall

"That's my office," Noah heard himself say, smugly, some of the grin leaking out.

"_Is_ it, sir?" There was a suspicious, knowing tone in the man's voice, one that caused a shiver of foreboding to travel up Noah's spin.

"Noah… what are you talking about?" Cathleen looked up, confused and full of dramatized grief.

Noah ignored her and, holding the man's eyes, backed up a little and walked, practically ran, down the hallway to _his_ office.

His _full_ office. Everywhere Noah looked, there was someone looking right back.

"Noah Kaiba?" another random, unknown man asked. "I'm Detective Farley. We have some questions for you, if you don't mind."

* * *

The_ orphan_ was sitting in what was now Noah's seat. And, his little orphan brother was sitting next to him in Seto's stolen chair from the other office.

Mokuba looked as if he also had spent a lot of time recently crying, but also as if he'd been up all night, unable to, or unwilling, to sleep. He sunk back into his seat as he saw Noah watching him. Seto reached over to grab his hand, not taking his eyes off of Noah, or even blinking. The hand not holding Mokuba's was clenched around the arm of the chair— _Noah's_ chair —and the knuckles were close to breaking through the skin.

"Detective Farley, is this really necessary?" Seto gritted the question out.

The man turned back to look at the young man he'd been speaking to through the night, one of the boys due to take over now that their father was...

"Yes, sir, I'm afraid we have to follow protocol in these matters." Farley was amazed with himself that he was actually calling this virtual kid 'sir.' But, he'd watched the seventeen-year-old and his reactions to this tragedy, and the way he had stepped up to the plate after the initial shock and grief was something that the detective had to respect. All the men in the room already did.

All the Big 5 members stood in a line against the right wall. Pegasus and Demebek were also there; Pegasus even saw fit to take things serious for a moment and had a grim cast to his features. All seven of them stared at the wall directly across from them, except for Crump, with a vicious bruise across his left cheek, who stared down a the carpet as he fidgeted, and Lector, who was glaring daggers at Noah and Seto back and forth in turn.

"Fine," Seto sighed, just wanting things to move forward after the long night.

"Sh-shouldn't we tell him what's happened?" Mokuba spoke up, his voice on the verge of breaking as he spoke.

"Not quite yet," another detective said quickly, allowing Farley to take over before Noah was given too much information.

"Noah, when was the last time you saw your father?" Farley asked.

Noah made his eyes widen considerably, but not too much; he didn't want to break the scabs open across his cheek. Blood was not a good look for the innocent. The guilty, on the other hand…

"Last I saw Father was… yesterday, mid-evening. He was in here with Lector and I asked to have a private word with him." Noah nodded at his father's personal assistant, providing a witness to support his facts. "Has something happened to my father? And, why are there policemen outside my building?"

_His building?_ Seto thought, frowning. Did Farley catch that?

"According to Lector, your father never returned after your chat," Farley continued, ignoring Noah's questions for now. And, yes, he had caught how Noah referred to the building as his. "Could you tell me what you and he talked about?"

Noah looked down and didn't answer for a long time. Finally, he sighed, and looked directly into Seto's eyes. "I hadn't wanted to, but I knew it was necessary to keep the company in the family. My father and I talked about how I had found out that he—" Noah pointed at Seto, sitting in _Noah's_ chair "—was planning on sweeping Kaiba Corp. out from beneath our feet. With the help of several people here, as a matter of fact."

Farley looked back at Seto and around at the men in suits gathered around the periphery of the room, but returned his attention steadily to Noah. "And, where did your father go after that?"

"I don't know. I left him in the elevator and headed home after that. He didn't seem well, no doubt from the shock of _his_ betrayal, but he wanted to be alone, so I let him… Where is he?"

"Was any part of your talk an argument, Noah?" Farley persisted.

"No. Are you going to tell me what's going on?"

"What happened to your hand, Noah?"

That gave Noah pause, and his surprise as he looked down at his hand was absolutely real. He'd bandaged it at least. Again, blood didn't mix well with innocence. But the dressing was poorly done and fairly suspicious looking.

_Shit. Blood probably got on his suit when I pushed him._

"I punched a mirror. In the thirteenth floor's bathroom," Noah answered honestly, figuring that they probably already knew about the broken mirror.

"Why?"

"I thought someone was in there with me who shouldn't be."

"Anyone specific in mind?" Farley pressed.

"No," Noah bit out. _Keep cool_. "What's going on? Where's my father? Is he okay?"

"Noah, perhaps you should take a seat," Farley suggested, indicating one of the chairs set up in front of Gozaburo's desk.

"I'll stand, thank you," Noah answered, brittle in his tone. There was only one chair he wanted and it was occupied.

Farley sighed. "Alright, then." He looked over his shoulder at the other two living Kaibas, wishing that, as the family, they would break the news to their brother. But, it was a hazard of the job…

"Noah, last night, sometime between eight ten and eight thirty, your father fell from the roof of this building and died on impact… I'm very sorry… Noah?"

_Don't smile, don't smile, don't smile…_

"Oh… God," Noah was finally able to get out. He forced his knees to buckle slightly before catching himself. "W-what happened?"

"_Christ,_" Seto spat behind the desk, in Noah's seat. Just looking at him, you could see he was frustrated, angry, tired, and, perhaps, sad. He was done with Noah's and Farley's pretending. "Can we _please_ just move on?"

"Just a moment more—"

"This is your fault!" Noah suddenly screamed. Again, he was pointing at Seto. "I-if you hadn't," Noah paused to take a shaking gasp, "if you hadn't taken the company away from him, he'd still be alive. It's your fault he jumped!" he accused. "Can't everyone see that?"

The whole room stared at him for a moment. Then, Pegasus snorted. "My, you Kaibas are quite entertaining, aren't you? And, so good at acting!" Pegasus chortled to himself.

"That's enough, sir," Farley reprimanded. He turned back to Noah and, after taking a deep breath, reached into his jacket pocket. "Noah, do you recognize these?"

Inside a clear evidence bag, covered in blood, were Noah's bent and twisted glasses.

Noah swallowed. "They're my glasses."

"Ah. And, can you tell me where those scratches came from on your cheeks?" Farley drifted his fingers across his own cheek as he tracked the scratches across Noah's.

"…U-um." Noah suddenly couldn't think of anything. Up until this moment, Noah hadn't actually considered that everything wouldn't work out perfectly for him. Gozaburo was gone, Seto and Mokuba would be gone, and Noah would get Kaiba Corp. That would be the end of it.

But, no one had even considered the idea that Gozaburo's death might be a suicide. And, now his glasses had been produced, glasses that he had last seen falling through the air, next to his father.

"Noah," Farley called his attention back. "Your glasses were found clasped in your father's hand. There was also blood under your father's fingernails, as well as in a handprint on his lapels. Later, I'm going to have to ask you for a DNA sample, but, for now, could you tell me your exact movements last night, after your brothers went home?"

Noah slowly looked around the room, seeing through the fuzziness of his vision that there wasn't one person who didn't already seem to know the answer. The people in the lobby and the servants at home, they must already know too. Everyone seemed to know what he'd done.

But, _he_ was the president of Kaiba Corp. now. No matter what he'd done, he deserved their respect and adoration.

Noah's gaze finally settled on Seto, sitting in the president of Kaiba Corp.'s chair. What should be _Noah's _chair.

Seto met Noah eye for eye.

"You've saved me the trouble of figuring out what to do with you and Pops, at least," Seto murmured.

Mokuba looked up at his brother at that comment and the note of hidden sorrow in it. He knew Seto had been completely committed to the idea of removing Gozaburo from his thrown, but he obviously hadn't been plotting the old man's death. He'd been calling him '_Pops_' ever since they'd first met back at the orphanage… Maybe he'd actually meant it?

In any case, Mokuba swore there was a slight, barely visible sheen of tears in Seto's eyes. Besides Seto's and Mokuba's own relationship, Gozaburo's and Seto's had been the most developed and _real_ within the Kaiba family. Not necessarily as if Gozaburo had actually come to see him as his son, but still as someone he may have been capable of caring about, even if he had been hard on him.

They'd never know how Gozaburo really felt now.

"It's not proven yet whether your brother actually did anything wrong yet, Mr. Kaiba," Detective Farley addressed at Seto, trying to maintain order, but the way he said it made it clear that it was only a matter of time before it was. "Where were you last night after your brothers went home, Noah?" the detective asked pointedly.

Noah couldn't hear anything. His whole world was made up of the fact that _Seto_ was sitting in _his_ chair.

"Noah? Could you please answer the—"

"_Get out of my chair!_" Noah screeched, startling everyone. It shocked everyone enough to give Noah a shot at his second murder. He scurried like a rabid rat around the detective and took a running jump onto the desk, hands scrabbling like claws for Seto's neck.

Mokuba screamed, falling to the ground as Seto pushed hard on his chair to get him out of the way. Not that Mokuba was, or had ever been, Noah's target.

Other shouts erupted as Noah clambered over the desk, trying to get purchase as Seto kept leaning and throwing his head back, trying just as hard to keep out of Noah's reach. Eventually Seto toppled over in the damnable chair and Noah fell to the ground just behind the desk. Seto continued backing away, towards the right so that he wouldn't be pinned against the wall of glass behind him, but he didn't have to worry at this point.

Noah had a new destination now, and Mokuba was the first one to see it as Noah scrambled to his feet.

"No, Noah!" he shouted, grabbing and wrapping himself around one of Noah's legs, trying to stop him from going to the window and throwing himself out.

Noah kicked his leg free of Mokuba's stubborn grip and swung it forward to smash the window pane. The force of it shattered the whole thing. Causing glass to fall down in a curtain to, eventually, land within the vicinity of the bloody splatter that had once been Gozaburo Kaiba. Noah stepped up to the hole left in the window. No matter what, he was determined to follow in his father's footsteps…

But, as he was about to step out into nothingness someone viciously grabbed him by the back of his jackets and threw him on the ground, coming to fall on top of him, having overbalanced.

_Seto!_ He just had to keep on ruining Noah's plans, didn't he?

Noah's fist connected with Seto mouth when the brunette wasn't expecting it, causing him to spit a gob of blood onto Noah's shirt. But, finally, Seto got him pinned underneath him, unable to hurt anyone, including himself, anymore. But, still Noah struggled.

"Kaiba Corp. was never going to be yours, Noah. Not ever," Seto hissed at him, wanting to make sure he understood what had really happened, blood still dripping from the cut in his mouth. At least it stopped Noah from trying to buck him off.

"You were too late Noah. Gozaburo was killed around eight twenty. You probably know the exact time. But, _I_ bought the company at seven forty-six. Kaiba Corporation is _mine_, Noah. You killed Pops for _nothing_." Seto gave him a harsh shake before repeating, "Nothing."

The teal-haired seventeen-year-old took a shuddering gasp as he looked into his adoptive brother's eyes, seeing the truth…

And, Noah broke down in wet, giggling sobs.

* * *

_Six months later:_

Kaiba Corp. sales were better than ever recorded in the history of the company.

"Congratulations, Mr. Kaiba," Lector drawled unhappily, having placed the reports concerning KC's rising revenues in front of Seto himself just a few minutes ago.

"Thank you, Lector," Seto replied civilly.

Noah may have been the one to actually push Gozaburo, but Lector blamed both of the previous Mr. Kaiba's ungrateful sons for all that had happened. The man had actually been loyal to Pops, which had both surprised and secretly delighted Seto, and had made him decide to keep the slightly hostile personal assistant around. It wasn't working out as well as Seto had hoped; Lector's loyalty to Gozaburo had not switched over to Seto just as everything else that had once belonged to the old man had. So, at this point, Lector's job mostly consisted of finding Seto a new assistant, which suited everyone just fine.

"If you don't mind," Lector started stiffly, "I have an appointment with a prospective assistant that I would like to prepare for."

"Of course, Lector. _Have fun_," Seto sarcastically wished, giving Lector a challenging look, getting a twitching glare back.

_The sooner Lector was gone the better,_ Seto thought as he watched Lector stalk out._ The same with the rest of the Big 5. _

Crump had already disappeared once he'd proven he'd had nothing to do with Gozaburo's murder. He was probably down in Antarctica, living as one with the penguin colonies there.

The current Big 3 would be gotten rid of as soon as possible. For now, let them think that they were safe and had Seto's gratitude keeping them in their positions. But, once they were all paid back and could no longer hold that Seto was in debt to them, they'd be gone. They'd betrayed a Kaiba once, and they could do it again.

Pegasus and Demebek would be the only ones left of Seto's original scheme in the end. Pegasus would slowly be paid with the gaming technology Kaiba Corp. now produced. Demebek would be harder to get rid of as Kaiba Corp. continued buying from him. But, eventually Seto would be able to say he wasn't indebted to anyone. Well, maybe someone.

Karen buzzed through the intercom into Seto's office about an hour later. He'd gotten rid of Cathleen, gently of course, after the horrors of having her boss pushed of a roof and his son, whom she'd been fond of, being the pusher. But, she'd still had to go. Everything that was part of the old Kaiba Corporation was slowly but surely being phased out, while the new era of Kaiba Corporation made the name its own.

"Mr. Kaiba—" and while Seto made the 'Kaiba' name his own "—Mokuba's here," Karen informed.

Seto didn't bother responding since Mokuba was already traipsing through the door.

"You're here early," Seto commented, smiling at his younger brother. School must have gotten out only ten minutes ago, and usually Mokuba stayed behind a little while, talking to teachers and other students. He was becoming quite the social butterfly.

"Yeah, I'm meeting someone later, so I couldn't stay," Mokuba answered, smiling even more widely back at his older brother as he sat down across from him.

"You're in the paper you know?" Seto commented.

Mokuba's eyes widened considerably. "Huh?"

"Well, your boots are, anyway," Seto continued cryptically. Looking up from beneath his bangs, Seto threw a section of the 'Daily Domino' at the even further confused Mokuba.

Mokuba caught it and looked to try to uncover whatever Seto could have meant. "Sister Mary Therese!" Mokuba exclaimed, immediately recognizing the nun. What was she holding? Was that…?

"Nothing ever went to waste at that place," Seto commented, watching Mokuba's amazed expression with a slight grin on his face. "Even the cats get put to work."

It had probably been a slow news day to bring out such a story, or maybe it was one of those feel-good deals that the media would bring in every now and then to make sure the population didn't become depressed and off themselves. But, in either case, the picture of Sister Mary Therese holding Boots didn't change, though, rather than just 'Boots,' the cat's name was captioned as being 'Mokie's Boots.' Supposedly, he was being used at the orphanage to rehabilitate the children who'd had painful pasts.

Mokuba gave an amazed chuckle that morphed into a full-blown laugh. "Didn't exactly help us, did he?"

Seto shrugged. "We were able to help ourselves."

"Yeah…" Mokuba smiled again. "Boots got _big_." The cat was over-flowing the boundaries of the Sister Mary Therese's arms.

Seto snorted, remembering the kitten only vaguely.

"Hey, you think I could get a cat now that—?"

"No," Seto said firmly. "No cats, no dogs, no pets of any kind that have teeth, grow fur, smell bad, make noise, or have been featured in a horror movie."

Mokuba pouted. That didn't leave much left.

Karen buzzed through the intercom again.

"Mr. Kaiba, Lector says that he would like to bring the man he was interviewing up for you to meet personally."

"Alright, Karen. Tell him to come up," Seto told her, giving Mokuba a slightly apologetic look.

Mokuba was already getting out of his seat. "It's cool. I have to get going anyway."

"Thanks, Mokie," Seto said, meaning it.

"Are you going to see Rebecca?" Seto asked, as his little brother reached the door.

"…No, I'm not," Mokuba admitted, slowly turning to look over his shoulder with a caught, semi-guilty look on his face.

Seto's face contorted and shifted between concerned, disgusted, and understanding before finally settling on reluctant, slightly frightened acceptance.

"You're going to see him, then?"

"Yeah. I just… feel bad, you know?"

Maybe Seto didn't know, but he wouldn't stop Mokuba, though he may wish he could.

"Just be careful. _Very_ careful."

"Trust me, I will be."

* * *

_The Maryhille Psychiatric Institute for the Criminally Insane_ was the sign that hung above the doorway that Seto's little brother was just now entering.

Mokuba walked down the sterile white hallway of the facility, a familiar creeping feeling of… _creepiness_ racing up his spine as he walked up to the reception desk.

A woman in her thirties, dressed in pastel nursing scrubs sat there and looked up tiredly as he approached. There was a single door beyond her that, from the outside, looked like it wasn't any more than a bland, white metal door that you just happened to have a security card to get past. But, Mokuba knew, from being on the other side of it so many times, that it was extensively reinforced with more locks than Mokuba had seen on any door, of both the electronic and manual sort.

"Ah. Mokuba," the weary receptionist greeted, making her best attempt at a smile. "I was wondering when you'd show up here again to abuse the system."

Mokuba chuckled uncomfortably. "Yeah…"

"Just take a seat and I'll let Dr. Jenni and one of our boys know you're here," the woman waved him off, turning to her phone.

Mokuba sat down in one of the benches along the walls and fell prey to the thoughts and memories that the receptionist's comment about abusing the system brought up.

It wasn't really abuse… it had just been skillful lawyering on Johnson's part… and a series of bribes from the existing, sane members of the Kaiba family.

What the receptionist had meant was that the Maryhille Psychiatric Institute was a medium secure unit, not a high secure one, and the only reasons Noah wasn't in a higher one was for the reasons above. One of the arguments that had been used during Noah's sentencing (there was no way that Noah hadn't killed Gozaburo, so they hadn't even attempted a plea of 'not guilty') was that his murder of his father and attempted murder of his brother were both personal issues that did not indicate a general urge to kill. Still, some of the staff didn't have quite the same faith that Noah wouldn't someday come after them, too…

Mokuba winced. He couldn't believe that in some ways this wasn't directly Noah's fault, but he did feel that Noah had been pushed over the edge by a variety of outside forces. And, he felt guilty because he knew that two of those reasons had been himself and Seto. He had a feeling that Seto knew that too, but that wasn't the reason why Seto had been in support of a medium secure institution.

There had been no way to hide the events at Kaiba Corporation from the public, and the press had had more than a field day; they'd been absolutely _beside_ themselves with happiness and viewership.

Everyone knew that Gozaburo had been pushed off his own building by his own son, and that that same son had tried to kill his adoptive brother just the next day before attempting suicide. It had been, well, insane for a while. To lighten the damage done to the company and the Kaiba name, Seto had done his best for Noah, having Johnson represent him, making sure that the courts understood that Noah wasn't mentally stable (not that it wasn't obvious), and convincing the judge that Noah wasn't a threat to anyone but himself any longer.

A door near the entrance to the institute opened and a large man in white scrubs came out. He nodded to Mokuba, who smiled uncertainly back, before leaning against the wall opposite. Dr. Jenni arrived not too long after.

"Hello, Mokuba," the Doctor welcomed, giving him one of her more genuine smiles. He was one of the few people who visited their relative residing inside Maryville on a regular basis, and he was definitely the sweetest.

"Hi, Dr. Jenni," Mokuba replied, also smiling, though it was several shades dimmer than his normal ones.

"Let's be off," she said, turning and leading the way. The man in white pushed away from the wall and followed.

Dr. Jenni opened the door behind the reception desk and led Mokuba and the man through the twisting, twining corridors of the institute.

"So, how is he?" Mokuba finally asked. He had been here so many times now that the guard trailing them didn't hamper his ability to talk only to Jenny while ignoring their shadow. It paid off later on as well.

Dr. Jenni gave a gentle, sympathetic smile. "He saw his scars yesterday and we had to sedate him to calm him down. But, other than that, he seems to be doing all right. He's still calling the nurses by the names of your housekeeping staff at home. I'm 'Anna' according to him. We'd just as well keep letting Noah think that this is still the Kaiba estate rather than force the truth on him. It could send him into another breakdown."

Mokuba shuddered at the thought.

They reached Noah's… room? Cell? Mokuba never really knew what to call it. Whatever it was, everything inside it was white and either padded or plastic, and sometimes both. Even the window that Noah was sitting in front of wasn't made of glass, but hard clear synthetic material that allowed you to see out across the lawns of the institute, but couldn't be shattered like the, say, windows at Kaiba Corp.

Mokuba could easily see all of this through another small window sat into the door.

Dr. Jenni stopped him before they entered the room. "Besides the sedation, we decided to, for his own safety, put him in a straightjacket. So, don't be alarmed when you see it," the doctor warned him.

Mokuba's eyes widened. He didn't know they used straightjackets anymore. But, he nodded, and Dr. Jenni opened the door.

"Noah, you have a visitor," Dr. Jenni informed her patient.

Noah didn't say anything. He just continued staring out the window.

"Hi, Noah," Mokuba greeted, knowing he sounded way too cheerful, not to mention false, for everything to just be normal.

Noah, again, said nothing. Just stared.

"I'll come by in a little while to see you out. We don't want him getting overworked, so keep it a short visit and don't mention anything too… controversial." Dr. Jenni left then, but the man in the white scrubs stayed behind, setting himself up as a sort of nonthreatening guard in the corner. Just in case.

"So," Mokuba started, taking the only other chair in the room close to Noah, though not too close. "Everything's going well… um, I really like my school. The girl I told you about last time, Rebecca? She's got this huge crush on this guy a year or so older than us. His name is Yugi Moto and his grampa owns a game shop. But, anyway, he's all Rebecca will talk about now, and…"

Mokuba kept talking about inanities, like how he'd decided to take a gourmet class next year in case he should ever move anywhere on his own, and how he was thinking of maybe getting a goldfish or something else that couldn't get into much trouble and met all of Seto's criteria in a pet. Noah sat and didn't seem to listen, the same dull, half-lidded look in his familiar cobalt eyes. His glasses had never been returned to him, and no one had ever thought to get him a new pair. He didn't really need them anymore.

It was about half an hour later when Mokuba came to a pause in his inconsequential chatter.

"Mokuba," Dr. Jenni said from the door. "I think that's been enough for now, yes?"

"Yeah… bye, Noah. I'll see you next week, okay?" Mokuba slowly got up from the chair, pausing to see if he got any reaction out of Noah. But, there was none. There never was, even when he wasn't sedated.

Mokuba left, following Dr. Jenni, and the man in white following them both.

Noah was left alone in his room, seeming as if he had no recollection of who had come to see him, or that he'd been visited at all.

But, then he started mumbling lowly to himself.

"Mokuba… orphan, orphan, orphan… _Ssseto! _...Father… Father… _Father?_ …Roof… splat, splat, splat… Father?" It continued growing louder and louder until a passing member of the staff heard his ranting and ran off to find Dr. Jenni.

"Father, Seto, Father, Seto, _Father, Seto_, Father loving Seto. Love, love, _love!_ Do you love me now, Father? _Do you?_"

**The End**

**Just to be politically correct, the term "criminally insane" is no longer a recognized legal or medical term, but I believed that it helped create the correct atmosphere for the story.**

**Alas, there is no next chapter of ****The Kaiba Heir****, but I would like to thank everyone who has made it thus far, especially those of you who have been with it from the beginning. I hope you liked the resolution of ****The Kaiba Heir****, and, again, thank you for reading and for helping me with my Senior Culminating Project!**


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